This book presents a health ethnology of health literacy among vulnerable groups. In addition to a comprehensive state of research and the development of a theory-oriented health literacy research, three case studies on vulnerable minorities from Germany and Switzerland are presented. The social dimension of health and health literacy, which can hardly be conceptualized in the individualistic competence-theoretical approaches, is particularly clearly highlighted. This book is a translation of the original German 1st edition Health Literacy aus gesundheitsethnologischer Perspektive by Uwe H. Bittlingmayer, published by Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature in 2020. The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation. Springer Nature works continuously to further the development of tools for the production of books and on the related technologies to support the authors.

In this anthology of health literacy, drawing on New Social Literacy studies and contemporary debates on equity, we discuss health literacy within German regional and cultural contexts as well as in selected non-European regions, such as in Asia and South America. Topics include unique reviews on health literacy, new empirical results on different population groups, in-depth ethnographic insights into social contexts, interventions intended to improve health literacy, and innovative theoretical dialogs. The discussions within this book provide new ideas and intriguing new results, also shedding light on the explanatory power of the health literacy concept as well as its boundaries.

Im vorliegenden Buch wird eine Gesundheitsethnologie der Gesundheitskompetenz von vulnerablen Gruppen vorgelegt. Dabei werden neben einem umfassenden Forschungsstand und die Entwicklung einer theorie-orientierten Health-Literacy-Forschung drei Fallstudien uber vulnerable Minderheiten aus Deutschland und der Schweiz prasentiert. Besonders deutlich herausgestellt wird die soziale Dimension von Gesundheit und Gesundheitskompetenz, die in den individualistischen kompetenztheoretischen Zugangen kaum konzeptionalisiert werden kann.

After years of military interventions, the current situation in Afghanistan is highly ambivalent and partially contradictory - especially regarding the interplay of development, peace, security, education, and economy. Despite numerous initiatives, Afghanistan is still confronted with a poor security and economic condition. At the same time, enrollment numbers in schools and universities as well as the rate of academics reached a historical peak. This volume investigates the tension between these ambivalent developments. Sociologists, political and cultural scientists along with development workers, educators, and artists from Germany and Afghanistan discuss the idea that education is primary for rebuilding a stable Afghan state and government.