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Urban Geography Plenary Lecture—Public Health as Urban Politics, Urban Geography

Venereal Biopower in Seattle, 1943-1983

Bibliographic Data

ID8097166
AuthorsMichael G Brown (0000-0002-2561-7037, University of Washington), Michael Brown (0000-0003-3839-9822, corresponding author)
Year2009
Volume30
Issue1
Pages1-29
Publication date2009-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueUrban Geography (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0272-3638 • E-ISSN: 1938-2847
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.2747/0272-3638.30.1.1
OpenAlexW1985069233
LanguageEN
Citations received31
References cited48

In this plenary, I call for urban geographers to frame public health as a form of urban politics, theorized as governmentality and biopower. I interpret the politics of venereal disease (VD) in Seattle during the mid-20th century this way, detecting a series of dualities in key dimensions of the governance of VD, thus extending geographers' work on these concepts. There was an epistemic duality between biomedical and social framings of disease, a simultaneous techne between ascending and descending modes of power; a duality between descriptive and predictive visibilities; an identity paradox around which bodies were at risk; and a duality in ethos between conservative and progressive principles. Interpreting the city politics of public health this way foregrounds this local-state function as an important topic for urban political geography and brings a series of literatures together into conversation that have tended to remain distinct

Biopower · Ethos · Governmentality · Political science · Politics · Public health · Social science · Sociology · Body Image and Dysmorphia Studies · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Medicine · Zoonotic diseases and public health · Law · Public Administration

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Unique citing works31
Citations per year1,82
Citation span2009 - 2024 (16)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 30
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