Summer Course
MEDICAL HUMANITIES
ITALIAN PERSPECTIVES
7-12 September 2014, Padua - Venice
“The spirit of Humanities is the greatest single gift in education.”
William Osler, The Old Humanities and the New Science, 1919.
Fondazione Lanza (Center of Advanced Studies in Ethics, Padua - Italy), in
collaboration with the Chair of History of Medicine at the University of Padua
and the Chair of Medical Humanities at the Marmara University in Istanbul, is
pleased to announce the first edition of the Summer Course on Medical
Humanities, that will take place in Padua and Venice from Sunday 7 to Friday
12, September 2014.
Why a Course on Medical Humanities?
We believe that in our age of a deeply technologically-driven medicine is necessary to
re-establish and promote the neglected relationship between medicine and the arts.
Therefore, in our course, we propose an integrated and interdisciplinary approach to
recording and interpreting human experiences of illness, disability, care and medical
intervention.
Experts of painting, sculpture, literature, cinema, forensic sciences, psychiatry,
bioethics and medical history will offer their qualified observations in order to reflect on
illness, medicine and the role of physician and nurse. All these contributions will help
us to go beyond a reductive conception of a medicine which is only able to scientifically
explain illness. Human sciences will help us to achieve a broader idea of illness, medical
care, and care; looking not only for an explication, but for a whole compre hension of the
human side of illness, both at the personal and social level.
Why in Padua?
Henry Sigerist, historian of medicine, describes Padua as the cradle of modern
medicine. Here Giovanni Battista De Monte (1489-1551) developed for the first time
clinical medicine, teaching medicine at the bedside; Andreas van Wesel (1514-1564)
taught anatomy at the University of Padua; William Harvey had his first ideas on blood
circulation in Padua; Gabriele Falloppio (1523-1562) discovered here the uterine tubes;
Girolamo Fabrici d’Acquapendente (1533-1619) and Giovan Battista Morgagni (16821771) wrote in Padua their masterpieces on pathological anatomy; Labour Medicine was
started in Padua by Bernardino Ramazzini (1633-1714), and so on. At the same University
Galileo Galilei taught for 18 years, developing the scientific method.
MEDICAL HUMANITIES SUMMER COURSE - ITALIAN PERSPECTIVES
7-12 September 2014 ??? – Padua - Venice
At the same time Padua is also, as William Shakespeare wrote in The Taming of the
Shrew, the “nurse of Arts”. In fact, Padua expressed, especially in the XIV, XV , and
XVI centuries, an impressive and extraordinary artistic culture with artists as Giotto,
Donatello, Tiziano, etc.
Finally, Padua, the city of Saint Anthony, is a place where a religious feeling strongly
oriented towards charity is deeply rooted. This is why the history of Padua is strictly
linked to the history of its hospitals.
These are the reasons why we will start our course from this particular history, in
which medicine, art and religion were able to find an extraordinary synthesis. Then,
with the help of our major experts, we will actualize these teachings trying to apply
them in an effort to humanize modern medicine.
Course aims and objectives: Offer insights into Medical Humanities and their
relevance in Medicine and Arts. Visit monuments, museums, etc., in order to make explicit
the ethical values represented by them.
Contents: Medical Humanities and Bioethics; Charity and its Artistic Interpretations;
Medical History and Medical Humanities; Painting, Literature, Sculpture, Architecture,
Cinema and Medicine; Arts, Medicine and Psychiatry. At the end of the course an
Attendance Certificate will be issued.
Course fee: Euro 650,00 (payable until July 27, 2014). It includes tuition, lectures,
guided tours, local transfers, teaching materials, coffee-breaks and a dinner
(accommodation, travel, and meals expenses are not included).
Scientific Committee: Prof. Luciana Caenazzo (University of Padua), Prof. Sefik
Görkey (Marmara University of Istanbul), Prof. Renzo Pegoraro (Fondazione Lanza), Prof.
Maurizio Rippa Bonati (University of Padua), Prof. Fabrizio Turoldo (Fondazione Lanza,
Ca’ Foscari University of Venice)
Direction: Prof. Renzo Pegoraro
Secretariat: Dr. Lucia Mariani, Fondazione Lanza, via Dante, 55 - 35139
Padova - Tel./Fax: ++39.0498756788 - email: info@fondazionelanza.it
web: www.fondazionelanza.it/medicalhumanities/
General Information: To see the complete program, to apply, and for logistic
information, please, visit the following website:
www.fondazionelanza.it/medicalhumanities/
Deadlines: Application Form until 15 July 2014 - Payment: until 27 July 2014.