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Well-Being: Learning from South Asia (UNIB20025)
Undergraduate level 2Points: 12.5Not available in 2023
To learn more, visit 2023 Course and subject delivery.
Overview
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How has wellness and ‘well-being’ been understood and represented through history and across the world? What might an engagement with Asia tell us about well-being? And what might exploring these questions reveal about how we should pursue our own wellness and that of others in the context of converging environmental and social crises?
In this interdisciplinary breadth subject, we examine these issues through engaging with debates in science, medicine, geography, anthropology, design, and other disciplines. We also focus especially on Asia and, within this, South Asia, a region with a ‘special relationship’ to ideas of well being. A key argument is that close reflection on different wellness traditions in Asia, and especially South Asia, can change our scholarly and personal understanding of what constitutes well being and happiness.
In Part I of the subject – titled ‘Orientations’ – we examine the science and philosophy of human well-being and ‘happiness’, engaging especially with work in neuroscience, philosophy, and the social sciences. We also look at different approaches to wellness within different religious, artistic, and architectural traditions in Asia and South Asia, with a particular focus on Buddhism and indigenous knowledge in South Asia and more broadly.
In Part II – ‘Wellness in Asia’ – we examine how ideas of ‘well-being’ figure in humanities and social science accounts of Asia and South Asia. We focus especially on the themes of the “nature of well being” and “the well-being of nature” in contemporary South Asia, drawing on the work of social scientists and scholars working in the environmental sphere as well as the expertise of scholars in the fields of design and fine art. This includes an examination of new efforts to rebuild well being and happiness, for example through new indigenous mobilisations India, the attempt to construct a national happiness index in Bhutan, the emergence of alternative environmental experiments in Nepal, and efforts to imagine well-being and happiness in architecture, planning, art, and geographical practices across South Asia and Asia more broadly.
In Part III – ‘Everyday Well-Being in South Asia’ - we narrow our focus to examine social science and public health accounts of the everyday experience of the poor in contemporary South Asia, with particular reference to issues around health and the impact of Covid-19. We consider how a health crisis may, somewhat paradoxically, also lead to new reflection on what constitutes well-being and new experiments in the representation of well-being and happiness, including within indigenous communities.
In every component of the subject, we will seek to provide students with a capacity to apply, experience, and produce wellness in their own lives and those of others. We will also foster an appreciation of what types of scholarly evidence and analysis are required to understand well-being from multiple disciplinary and geographical perspectives and across the humanities/social science and sciences boundary.
Intended learning outcomes
On completion of this subject, students should be able to:
- Collate, summarise, and evaluate scholarly work relating to well-being with particular reference to South Asia
- Identify different disciplinary approaches to well-being, including work that uses medical evidence, environmental data, large data sets, in-depth anthropological case studies, and arts and design practice
- Apply a comparative perspective to the study of well-being, for example understanding differences between how well-being is understood in different South Asian countries
- Illustrate why it is important to study well-being and appreciate how the subject's content might be applied in students' own lives
- Work with student colleagues from diverse backgrounds and appreciate different personal approaches to understanding, experiencing, and producing well being.
Generic skills
Upon successful completion of this subject, students will have skills in:
- reading, presenting, and synthesising scholarly research
- conducting library searches for relevant literatures
- analysing conceptual ideas
- thinking across different contexts to identify comparative opportunities
- reflecting on different disciplinary approaches
- appreciation of the value of different students' perspectives
Last updated: 22 March 2024
Eligibility and requirements
Prerequisites
Corequisites
Non-allowed subjects
Inherent requirements (core participation requirements)
The University of Melbourne is committed to providing students with reasonable adjustments to assessment and participation under the Disability Standards for Education (2005), and the Assessment and Results Policy (MPF1326). Students are expected to meet the core participation requirements for their course. These can be viewed under Entry and Participation Requirements for the course outlines in the Handbook.
Further details on how to seek academic adjustments can be found on the Student Equity and Disability Support website: http://services.unimelb.edu.au/student-equity/home
Last updated: 22 March 2024
Assessment
Description | Timing | Percentage |
---|---|---|
Reflective journal (minimum of 5 weekly entries max 360 words per entry)
| Week 6 (covering first five weeks – 2 entries) Week 12 (covering second seven weeks – 3 entries) | 40% |
Tutorial oral presentation - students will give a 10-minute oral presentation based on one of the key tutorial readings for that week
| Weeks 3-11 | 20% |
Tutorial participation - Tutorial participation will be assessed by noting productive participation in tutorials | Weeks 3-11 | 10% |
Essay - This needs to be on a different topic to the oral presentation.
| During the examination period | 30% |
Hurdle requirement: Tutorial attendance is required for this subject; if a student does not attend a minimum of 75% of tutorials without an approved exemption she/he/they will not be eligible for a pass in this subject. | N/A |
Additional details
Last updated: 22 March 2024
Dates & times
Not available in 2023
What do these dates mean
Visit this webpage to find out about these key dates, including how they impact on:
- Your tuition fees, academic transcript and statements.
- And for Commonwealth Supported students, your:
- Student Learning Entitlement. This applies to all students enrolled in a Commonwealth Supported Place (CSP).
Subjects withdrawn after the census date (including up to the ‘last day to withdraw without fail’) count toward the Student Learning Entitlement.
Additional delivery details
The subject will include a two-hour lecture each week designed to encourage active participation. The lectures will involve interactive activities, occasional small-group work (such as discussion in pairs), video, short multimedia presentations, and the use of vivid research case studies to exemplify key points.
The subject will also involve a one-hour tutorial per week throughout the semester. Tutors will promote group-based learning through the discussion of carefully selected articles and other activities. Tutors will maximise student engagement and opportunities for interdisciplinary exchange through encouraging students to reflect on how their own backgrounds and experience shapes their interpretation of the subject material.
Last updated: 22 March 2024
Further information
- Texts
Prescribed texts
There are no specifically prescribed or recommended texts for this subject.
- Breadth options
This subject is available as breadth in the following courses:
- Bachelor of Arts
- Bachelor of Biomedicine
- Bachelor of Commerce
- Bachelor of Design
- Bachelor of Environments
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Animation)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Dance)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Film and Television)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Music Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Production)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Screenwriting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Visual Art)
- Bachelor of Music
- Bachelor of Science
- Available through the Community Access Program
About the Community Access Program (CAP)
This subject is available through the Community Access Program (also called Single Subject Studies) which allows you to enrol in single subjects offered by the University of Melbourne, without the commitment required to complete a whole degree.
Entry requirements including prerequisites may apply. Please refer to the CAP applications page for further information.
- Available to Study Abroad and/or Study Exchange Students
This subject is available to students studying at the University from eligible overseas institutions on exchange and study abroad. Students are required to satisfy any listed requirements, such as pre- and co-requisites, for enrolment in the subject.
Last updated: 22 March 2024