Negotiating Structural Vulnerability in Cancer Control

What can case studies about the lived experiences of cancer contribute to an interest in the concept of structural vulnerability? And can a consideration of structural vulnerability enhance applied anthropological work in cancer prevention and control? To answer these questions the contributors in this volume explore what it means to be structurally vulnerable; how structural vulnerabilities intersect with cancer risk, diagnosis, care seeking, caregiving, clinical-trial participation, and survivorship; and how differing local, national, and global political contexts and histories inform vulnerability. These case studies illustrate how quotidian experiences of structural vulnerability influence and are altered by a cancer diagnosis at various points in the continuum of care. In examining cancer as a set of diseases and biosocial phenomena, the contributors extend structural vulnerability beyond its original conceptualization to encompass spatiality, temporality, and biosocial shifts in both individual and institutional arrangements.