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Amanda M. Caleb, PhD

Professor of Medical Humanities
Department of Medical Education
North Campus

LOCATION(S)
Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine
Medical Sciences Building
525 Pine St., Office 3038
Scranton, PA 18509
570-687-9691, ext. 2285
acaleb@som.geisinger.edu

Professor of Medical Humanities

Biography

Amanda M. Caleb, PhD, is professor of medical humanities, having previously served as founding director and professor of Medical and Health Humanities and professor of English at Misericordia University. She holds a PhD in English and an MA in nineteenth-century studies from The University of Sheffield, a BA in English from Davidson College and is currently pursuing her MPH at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Her research interests include the medical and public health humanities, health communication, health narratology, narrative medicine, and bioethics and the Holocaust. She has published articles and book chapters on topics ranging from the medicalization of social policies to the rhetoric of pandemics, to the marginalization of people with disabilities during the COVID-19 pandemic, to dementia and the role of narrative medicine. She serves as the membership chair for the Health Humanities Consortium, is a steering committee member for the Department of Bioethics and the Holocaust for the International Chair in Bioethics (World Medical Association Cooperation Centre) and is an educational consultant for the Maimonides Institute for Medicine, Ethics, and the Holocaust (MIMEH) and the College Athletes for Respect and Equality Initiative (CARE). Dr. Caleb was the recipient of a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant to revise Misericordia’s Medical and Health Humanities curriculum; as part of second NEH grant, she developed two public health humanities projects: a YouTube lecture series, COVID-19 and the Humanities and a podcast, The Health Humanist.

Educational interests

Dr. Caleb is interested in how the health humanities can contribute to medical education in developing professional identity, improving interprofessional communication and contributing to social justice and health equity initiatives. She contributes to the community immersion, social justice and health equity, and population health themes in the MD curriculum.

Research interests

Dr. Caleb’s research is grounded in the fields of health humanities and health communication. She is interested in the ways in which health communication influences public perceptions of disease and disease transmission and how such communications can result in perceptions and policies of exclusion. This research is situated within a health narratology framework, whereby singular and collective narratives are analyzed for their structure, themes and functions and understood hermeneutically to improve health communication.

Recent publications

  • Caleb, A. M. (2022). Darwin and the Feminists: Nineteenth-Century Debates about Female Inferiority. In C. Jones, A. E. Martin, & A. Wolf (Eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women and Science Since 1660 (pp. 289-306). Palgrave
  • Caleb, A. M., & Gallin, S. (2021). Policies of Exclusion: The Impact of COVID-19 on People with Disabilities. Saint Louis Journal of Health Policy and Law, 14(2), 321-344. Full Text 
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). “A London cognita and a London incognita”: Mapping London in Arthur Machen’s The London Adventure, or the Art of Wandering. In A. Sanna (Ed.), Arthur Machen: Critical Essays (pp. 41-58). Lexington Books.
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). Social Contracts of Medicine. In P. Crawford & P. Kadetz (Eds.), The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Health Humanities. Palgrave.
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). Team Teaching in the Health Humanities. In P. Crawford & P. Kadetz (Eds.), The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Health Humanities. Palgrave.
  • Caleb, A. M., & Nordstrom, A. (2020). Authenticity and Empathy in Education: Team-Teaching “The Voices Project: Mental Health.” In C. Campion & A. Angello (Eds.), The Synergistic Classroom: Interdisciplinary Teaching in the Small College Setting (pp. 176-188). Rutgers University Press.
  • Caleb, A. M., & McDonald, S. (2020). Narrative Engagement with the Opioid Epidemic: From Personal Story to Personal Reflection. In T. D. Stimeling (Ed.), The Opioid Epidemic and US Culture: Expression, Art, and Politics in an Age of Addiction (pp. 171-181). West Virginia University Press.
  • Caleb, A. M. (2020). Lessons from Auschwitz: Education and Outreach. In J. Gillespie, L. Jasinski, & D. Gross (Eds.), Faculty as Global Learners: Opportunities and Strategies to Support Off-Campus Study Leaders at Liberal Arts Colleges (pp. 225-230). Lever Press. Full Text
  • Caleb, A. M. (2019). The Rhetorical Biopower of Eugenics: Understanding the Influence British Eugenics on the Nazi Program. Conatus Journal of Philosophy Bioethics and the Holocaust Special Issue, 4(2), 149-169. DOI: Full Text 
  • Caleb. A. M. (2019). Contested Spaces: The Heterotopias of the Victorian Sickroom. Humanities, 8(2), 80. Full Text
  • Caleb, A. M. (2019). Embracing the Negative Capability of Dementia. Survive and Thrive: A Journal for Medical Humanities and Narrative as Medicine, 4, article 12. Full Text

Recent presentations

Invited lectures

  • Caleb, A. M. (2021, Oct. 22). Policies of Health, Policies of Exclusion: People with Disabilities and the COVID-19 Pandemic Response. Misericordia University, Dallas, PA.
  • Caleb, A. M., & Gallin, S. (2021, Mar. 15). Policies of Exclusion: The Impact of COVID-19 on People with Disabilities. COVID-19: Health Equity and Law seminar. Saint Louis University School of Law. Saint Louis, MO. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2020, Nov. 13). “More Than a Mask”: A Case Study in In-/Exclusion. Royal Roads University. Victoria, BC, Canada. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2020, Nov. 7). Keynote address: Health Narratology: Analyzing Narratives to Improve Future Health Outcomes. Medicine, Humanity, and Media annual conference. Peking, China. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2020, Nov. 6). Narrative Medicine: Expanding Practices to Reduce Stigma and Improve Health. School of Health Communications, University of Peking. Peking, China. (via Zoom).

Conference presentations

  • Caleb, A. M. (2022). Campaigns of Inclusion, Campaigns of Exclusion: Public Health Responses to AIDS and COVID-19. Modern Language Association annual conference. Washington, DC (via Zoom).
  • Fellows, J. J., Caleb, A. M., Ferry, E., Horvath, A., Sliwinishi, S., & Weaver, L. J. (2021). Interdisciplinary Communication. Roundtable. Humanities Podcast Network Symposium (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). The White Ink of Feminist Revision Fairy Tales. Popular Culture Association annual conference. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). The Biopower of Pandemic Rhetorics. Health Humanities Consortium annual conference.  (via Zoom).
  • Byers, M., Dezanet, L., Nordstrom, A. H., Caleb, A. M., & Scaler Scott, K. (2021). Mastery and Performance Motivation across Seven Groups of College Students. Poster. Eastern Psychological Association annual conference. (via Zoom).
  • Karnish, B., Strausser, A., Weitzel, L., Nordstrom, A. H., Caleb, A. M., & Scaler Scott, K. (2021). Differences in Achievement Motivation across Four Groups of College Students. Poster. Eastern Psychological Association annual conference. (via Zoom).
  • Morgan, R., Pflueger, K., Nordstrom, A. H., Caleb, A. M., & Scaler Scott, K. (2021). Internal and External Locus of Control across Four Groups of College Students. Poster. Eastern Psychological Association annual conference. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2021). “Baby is as big as a guinea pig”: The (Non)Heteronormative Experience of Pregnancy. Modern Language Association annual conference. (via Zoom).
  • Caleb, A. M. (2019). The Villain Within: Internalized Ethical Conflicts in Tell Me a Story. Popular Culture Association annual conference. Washington, DC.
  • Lamb, E. G., Caleb, A. M., Berry, S., & Muskievicz, K. (2019). Data for Diverse and Inclusive Educational Environments. Health Humanities Consortium annual conference. Chicago, IL.

Education

PhD in English Literature, The University of Sheffield
MA in Nineteenth-Century Studies, The University of Sheffield
BA in English, Davidson College
PGCE, The University of Sheffield