REL 28.06 Medical Ethics and Islam
Religions and Religious authorities have long held control over the rights and rituals of the body from birth to death and in between. This course is about how Muslims have constructed medical ethics discourses, what are the major ethical problems that arise for Muslims seeking medical care, and how Muslims have managed religious and medical knowledge in healthcare decision making. Muslim Medical ethics is a story about gender, sexuality, race, religious authority, moral responsibility, God, colonialism, the state, capitalism, science and the practice of medicine. We will make critical study of all of these as we move from pre-modern to contemporary discourses and cover a variety of medical ethics issues in cases of reproductive health, abortion, organ transplantation, medical technology, end of life care, etc. We will also examine medical ethics theories/approaches and what might constitute Islamic theories/approaches for various Muslims.