Date of Award
2011
Document Type
Thesis
Publication Status
Version of Record
Submission Date
October 2026
Abstract
Allergies have taken on cultural meanings other than those offered by biomedicine. Interviews with allergic and non-allergic Americans were used to investigate the explanatory models of the lay population. This thesis uses ethnographic data to examine explanatory models of allergic conditions, highlighting metaphorical uses of allergies in American culture. The explanatory models of the subjects were contrasted to the biomedical model and the stereotypes created by the media in the United States. Important topics addressed in the analysis of the interview material were: what are the explanatory models of allergies in America, how do allergies influence the selfimage of someone with that condition, and how Americans with and without allergies perceive the allergic individual.
Extent
viii, 114 p. : ill.
Recommended Citation
Hilpert, Micheline M., "American perceptions of allergies" (2011). Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2010 - 2019. 215.
https://digitalcommons.fau.edu/etd_general_6/215
Identifier
FADT3171399
Comments
by Micheline M. Hilpert.|Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2011.|Includes bibliography.|Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2011. Mode of access: World Wide Web.|by Micheline M. Hilpert.