saude e sociedade

DOI: 10.1590/1413-81232014194.15202013

The teaching of social sciences in health: between practice and theory

Nelson Filice de Barros 1

1

Departamento de Saúde
Coletiva, Faculdade de
Ciências Médicas,
Universidade Estadual de
Campinas. R. Tessália
Vieira de Camargo 126,
Barão Geraldo. 13.083-887
Campinas SP Brasil. [e-mail] 7 nelson REV.pmd

Abstract The models of teaching social sciences and clinical practice are insufficient for the needs of practical-reflective teaching of social sciences applied to health. The scope of this article is to reflect on the challenges and perspectives of social science education for health professionals. In the
1950s the important movement bringing together social sciences and the field of health began, however weak credentials still prevail. This is due to the low professional status of social scientists in health and the ill-defined position of the social sciences professionals in the health field. It is also due to the scant importance attributed by students to the social sciences, the small number of professionals and the colonization of the social sciences by the biomedical culture in the health field.
Thus, the professionals of social sciences applied to health are also faced with the need to build an identity, even after six decades of their presence in the field of health. This is because their ambivalent status has established them as a partial, incomplete and virtual presence, requiring a complex survival strategy in the nebulous area between social sciences and health.
Key words Social sciences, Sociology of health,
Teaching, Identity, Integration

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Resumo Os modelos de ensino de ciências sociais e da clínica são insuficientes para as necessidades prático-reflexivas quando aplicados à saúde. O objetivo deste artigo é refletir sobre os desafios e as perspectivas do ensino de ciências sociais para profissionais da saúde. Na década de 1950 iniciou-se o