Tag: medical images

Dr. Stahl presents at Society for Christian Ethics annual meeting

Devan Stahl photoOn January 4, Center Assistant Professor Dr. Devan Stahl gave a presentation at the Society for Christian Ethics annual meeting in Louisville, KY titled “The Prophetic Challenge of Disability Art.”

For persons with chronic illness and disability, medical images can come to represent their stigmatized “otherness.” A growing group of artists, however, are transforming their medical images into works of visual art, which better represent their lived experience and challenge viewers to see the disability and illness differently. Dr. Stahl showed how disability art encourages a new ethic of communion in which embodied vulnerabilities are shared, celebrated, and reoriented toward the ground of being.

Learn more about Dr. Stahl’s work with medical images and visual art.

Dr. Stahl delivers keynote at Western Michigan University Medical Humanities conference

Devan Stahl photoThe Eighth Annual Western Michigan University Medical Humanities Conference was held September 13-14 in Kalamazoo, MI. Center Assistant Professor Dr. Devan Stahl and her sister Darian Goldin Stahl (dariangoldinstahl.com) delivered the keynote lecture on September 14, “Visualizing Chronic Illness in Medicine and the Arts.”

Based on their recently published book, Imaging and Imagining Illness, the presenters discussed the history of anatomical illustrations, the use of contemporary medical imaging technologies in the doctor-patient relationship, and how medical images affect persons living with chronic illness.

To hear more about this work from Darian and Dr. Stahl, listen to their episode of No Easy Answers in Bioethics, the Center’s podcast series: ‘Imaging and Imagining Illness’: Devan and Darian Stahl – Episode 7.

Dr. Stahl presents at Summer Institute on Theology and Disability

Devan Stahl photoOn June 14, Center Assistant Professor Dr. Devan Stahl delivered the Jean Vanier Emerging Scholar Lecture at the Summer Institute on Theology and Disability in Raleigh, NC. Dr. Stahl was awarded this lectureship based on her dissertation work and letters of recommendation regarding her scholarship on disability. Dr. Stahl’s lecture was titled, “From Idol to Icon: Transforming Medical Images into DisArt.” Based largely on her recent book, Imaging and Imagining Illness, she discussed how fine art can transform medical images and challenge our cultural associations with disability. Dr. Stahl is the third Vanier Emerging Scholar and co-director of the PhD seminar at the Summer Institute.

To learn more about Imaging and Imagining Illness, listen to Episode 7 of the Center’s podcast, No Easy Answers in Bioethics.

Episode 7: ‘Imaging and Imagining Illness’ with Devan and Darian Stahl

No Easy Answers in Bioethics logoEpisode 7 of No Easy Answers in Bioethics is now available! This episode features guests Devan Stahl, Assistant Professor in the Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences and the Department of Pediatrics and Human Development, and Darian Goldin Stahl, artist and printmaker. This episode delves into the intersection of fine art, illness, disability, and self-identity. The recently released book Imaging and Imagining Illness: Becoming Whole in a Broken Body began as a collaboration between sisters Devan and Darian, one with personal origins. The edited volume examines the impact of medical imaging technologies on patients and our wider culture. In this episode, they discuss Darian’s artistic process, how audiences have reacted to the artwork, and how they came to invite other scholars to build on their work.

Ways to Listen

This episode was produced and edited by Liz McDaniel in the Center for Ethics. Music: “While We Walk (2004)” by Antony Raijekov via Free Music Archive, licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. Full transcript available.

About: No Easy Answers in Bioethics is a podcast series from the Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences in the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine. Each month Center for Ethics faculty and their collaborators discuss their ongoing work and research across many areas of bioethics—clinical ethics, evidence-based medicine, health policy, medical education, neuroethics, shared decision-making, and more. Episodes are hosted by H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online.

Dr. Stahl explores how we see illness in new book ‘Imaging and Imagining Illness’

Devan Stahl photoCenter Assistant Professor Dr. Devan Stahl has a new book available from Cascade Books, Imaging and Imagining Illness: Becoming Whole in a Broken Body. Edited by Dr. Stahl with a foreword from Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, the collection of essays draws from the disciplines of medical humanities, literature, visual culture, philosophy, and theology.

'Imaging and Imagining Illness' book cover
The cover of Imaging and Imagining Illness. Image courtesy of the author.

From Dr. Stahl:

Imaging and Imagining Illness explores the effects of imaging technologies on patients’ body image and self-understanding as well as the ways they influence our cultural understandings of illness. The project began as a collaboration between my sister Darian Goldin Stahl and myself. After I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, I shared my stories of living with MS as well as my MRIs with Darian. As a print artist, Darian began using my scans in her artwork as a way to give a more complete picture of what it is like to live with illness. Darian’s art had a profound effect on how I saw myself and inspired me to open our collaboration to others. We invited four other scholars to build on our work from their unique disciplines and shed light on the meaning of illness and the impact medical imaging can have on our cultural imagination. Drs. Therese Jones and Kirsten Ostherr offer reflections from their disciplines of medical humanities and visual culture and media studies. Having read all of the previous chapters, Drs. Ellen T. Armour and Jeff P. Bishop build on previous insights and add reflections from theology and philosophy. By engaging illness through multiple disciplines, the book represents the many ways we can understand and represent illness.