Professional/Short course Introduction to Environmental and Public Health (online)

Content

This level 7 (Masters level) module syllabus typically includes:

• Philosophical and theoretical perspectives on health, illness, public health and environmental health, including epistemological and ontological arguments and social theories of subjectivity/objectivity, induction/deduction, structure, agency, human nature and modernity.
• Philosophical perspectives on community and society: community organisation; group and organisational theory; political ideology (individualism, collectivism, communitarianism, market capitalism, etc).
• Political and ethical values in environmental and public health: e.g. beneficence, equity, social justice, altruism, interdependence, social responsibility, harm principle, freedom, risk, etc.
• Contributions of primary academic disciplines to environmental and public health, specifically sociology, ecology, psychology, education, political science, economics and biomedicine.
• Historical and geographic trends and developments: evolution of the environmental and public health field; rise and prominence of biomedicine and scientific rationality; national and international political developments (including WHO and UN); global environmental and public health trends.
• Determinants of health and illness: national and international trends; cultural, social, environmental and political contexts; key health drivers.
• Inequalities in health, healthcare, opportunity and social status: social justice; rights and freedoms; local, national and international classification and social stratification (occupation, income, ethnicity, race, culture, religion, generation, age, gender, sexuality, opportunity and ability); political and ethical debates on inequality.

Learning and Teaching

Teaching is delivered in the format of online lectures, as audio podcasts or video capture, using appropriate software (e.g. Adobe Presenter, PowerPoint, etc.), online seminars and other web-based activities. Online seminar activities engage student-centred active learning techniques using online, Blackboard-based discussion platforms (e.g. Collaborate or equivalent) and blogs.

Essential, indicative and supplementary online learning materials and resources are also provided via Blackboard, with links to online library resources.

Study time

This is a distance learning module; there are no face-to-face contact hours. Directed learning is provided for each module, more detail of which is provided in the online Module Handbook and on the module Blackboard site.

You are supported via on-line communication (e.g. e-mail, collaborate, etc.). Approximately 30 hours of directed study (e.g. online lectures, seminars, etc) are delivered via Blackboard.