João Biehl
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João Guilherme Biehl is a Brazilian
medical anthropologist Medical anthropology studies "human health and disease, health care systems, and biocultural adaptation". It views humans from multidimensional and ecological perspectives. It is one of the most highly developed areas of anthropology and applied ...
known for his innovative studies of global health, poverty, and suffering. He is currently the Susan Dod Brown Professor of Anthropology, Chair of the Department of Anthropology, and Director of the Brazil LAB at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
. Biehl's scholarship has earned widespread acclaim, as well as several of the anthropology's most prestigious awards. These include the Margaret Mead Award,
Diana Forsythe Prize Diana Elizabeth Forsythe (November 11, 1947 – August 14, 1997) was a leading researcher in anthropology and a key figure in the field of science and technology studies. She is recognized for her significant anthropological studies of artificial i ...
, and two Rudolf Virchow Awards. Biehl was also a 2008
Guggenheim Fellow Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon individuals who have demonstrated d ...
.


Early life and education

Biehl grew up in the
favelas Favela () is an hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella name for several types of impoverished neighborhoods in Brazil. The term, which means slum or ghetto, was first used in the Morro da Providência, Slum of Providência in the center of Rio de J ...
outside of the town of
Novo Hamburgo Novo Hamburgo ('New Hamburg', ; ) is a Municipalities of Brazil, municipality in the southernmost Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, located in the metropolitan area of Porto Alegre, the state capital. As of 2020, its population was 247,032. Th ...
in Southern Brazil after migrating from the colonial interior with his parents and sister at the age of 4. He showed an early interest in education, entering the first grade and completing grade school a year earlier than most other children in Novo Hamburgo. He cites his passion for storytelling as stemming from receiving books for Christmas as a child, a rare commodity for poor families in the favelas. After completing high school he began studying journalism and theology at two different academic institutions, along with Greek and German, church history, philosophy and systematic theology in Porto Alegre. Biehl received his Bachelor of Arts in Theology from Escola Superior de Teologia da IECLB in 1985, his Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul The Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (, UFRGS) is a Brazilian public federal research university based in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul. UFRGS is among the largest and highest-rated universities in Brazil, having one of the largest nu ...
in 1985, his Master's of Arts in Philosophy from
Universidade Federal de Santa Maria The Federal University of Santa Maria (, UFSM) is a Brazilian public university located in Santa Maria (RS), Santa Maria, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, funded by the federal government of Brazil. It was founded in 1960, by Professor José ...
in 1991, his Masters of Arts in Anthropology from
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...
in 1994, his Doctor of Philosophy in Religion from the Graduate Theological Union at Berkeley in 1996, and his Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology from Berkeley in 1999. Biehl was a
National Institute of Mental Health The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The NIH, in turn, is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and is the primar ...
postdoctoral fellow at
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
in the Department of Anthropology and the Department of Global Health & Social Medicine from 1998 to 2000.


Career

João Biehl has been a member of the
Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Ein ...
,
Princeton Princeton University is a private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the Unit ...
(2002–03 and 2005–06); and a visiting professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes,
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
(2004). He is currently the Susan Dod Brown Professor of Anthropology at Princeton where he teaches
medical anthropology Medical anthropology studies "human health and disease, health care systems, and biocultural adaptation". It views humans from multidimensional and ecological perspectives. It is one of the most highly developed areas of anthropology and appli ...
and courses on science, technology and society, cultural globalization, and social theory. He is also the Co-Director of the Program in Global Health and Health Policy and holds an Old Dominion Professorship in the Council of Humanities. Professor Biehl held the Harold Willis Dodds Presidential University Fellowship (2004–2006) and received the Presidential Distinguished Teaching Award in 2005. He is currently coordinating a research and teaching partnership between Princeton University and the University of São Paulo centered on global health and the anthropology of health and medicine, along with a collaborative network on "Race and Citizenship in the Americas." He has been on the executive committee of 4 programs at Princeton (the Program of Latin American Studies, the Center for the Study of Religion, the Community-Based Learning Initiative, and Examination and Standing) and was the Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Anthropology from 2004-2005 and 2011-2012. Biehl was an Academic Adviser at Wilson College from 2004 to 2007, and has taught more than 20 undergraduate and graduate classes at Princeton since joining the faculty. He has also been a guest lecturer at more than 50 different universities around the world.


Publications

Biehl has written two books in English: '' Vita: Life in a Zone of Social Abandonment'' (
University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...
2005) and ''Will to Live: AIDS Therapies and the Politics of Survival'' (
Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, with the financial ...
2007). The books are ethnographic studies of the experience and treatment of mental illness and HIV/AIDS, respectively. Both Vita and Will to Live explore new geographies of access and marginalization that have emerged alongside pharmaceutical globalization. They also elaborate on networks of care that poor urban patients create in their daily struggles to survive. He has also written 4 books in Portuguese: "Entre as Montanhas" ("Between the Mountains") (Literalis, 2004), "Clandestino: No Cotidiano e na Teologia" ("Clandestine: Theology and Ordinary Life ") (Vozes/Sinodal, 1990), "Igual pra Igual: Um Diálogo Crítico entre a Teologia da Libertação e as Teologias Negra, Feminista e Pacifista" ("From Equal to Equal: A Critical Dialogue between Latin American Liberation Theology and Black, Feminist and Pacifist Theologies") (Vozes/Sinodal, 1987) and "Tudo a Ver: Uma Viagem Sem Roteiros pela América do Sul" ("All to See: A Journey through South America") (Sinodal, 1987.) Biehl is the co-editor of "When People Come First: Critical Studies in Global Health" (Princeton University Press) and ''Subjectivity: Ethnographic Investigations'' (
University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...
2007) and of the book series "Critical Global Health" (Duke University Press.) He is writing the history of a fratricidal war—the Mucker war—that took place among
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
immigrants in 1874 in southern
Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
. His
ethnographic Ethnography is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. It explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnography is also a type of social research that involves examining ...
research focuses on domestic crimes and the monetarization of
kinship In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says that ...
ties in that region. His work has been published in
American Ethnologist The American Ethnological Society (AES) is the oldest professional anthropological association in the United States. History of the American Ethnological Society Albert Gallatin and John Russell Bartlett founded the American Ethnological Society ...
; Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry; Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies;
Public Culture ''Public Culture'' is a peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary academic journal of cultural studies published by Duke University Press. It is sponsored by the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University. ''Public Culture'' h ...
; and
Social Text ''Social Text'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Duke University Press. Since its inception by an independent editorial collective in 1979, ''Social Text'' has addressed a wide range of social and cultural phenomena, covering ques ...
.


Awards

"Vita" garnered six major book awards, including the Margaret Mead Award of the American Anthropological Association. "Will to Live" received the Wellcome Medal of Britain's Royal Anthropological Society and the
Diana Forsythe Prize Diana Elizabeth Forsythe (November 11, 1947 – August 14, 1997) was a leading researcher in anthropology and a key figure in the field of science and technology studies. She is recognized for her significant anthropological studies of artificial i ...
of the American Anthropological Association. Biehl received Princeton University's Presidential Distinguished Teaching Award in 2005 and the Graduate Mentoring Award in 2012. His research has been supported by grants from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Princeton's Health Grand Challenges Initiative, and Princeton's Council of International Teaching and Research Foundation.


References


External links


joaobiehl.net - Official website
* Biehl with one of his interlocutorsbr>
{{DEFAULTSORT:Biehl, Joao Brazilian anthropologists Brazilian Protestants Medical anthropologists Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people) Brazilian people of German descent UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science alumni Princeton University faculty Graduate Theological Union alumni