Caring communities under neoliberalism: A biosocial, ethnographic investigation of social prescribing in the UK

This project will investigate different articulations of health and care in the context of social prescribing. Under social prescribing sufferers of chronic illnesses are referred to local, non-clinical services by primary care workers. Embedded in its rollout is an acknowledgment of the social determinants of health. Its potential to challenge inequalities is, however, likely shaped by the intricacies of service users' lived experiences. Using anthropological methods and theories, my proposed research seeks to explore understandings of 'health' articulated by those participating in and delivering social prescribing, and, therefore, whether social prescribing reduces or further entrenches health inequalities.

To address these questions, I will undertake an ethnography of social prescribing in the UK, facilitated by my supervisory connection to the National Academy of Social Prescribing. This will involve multi-sited participant observation with a small group of service users in their daily lives and interactions with the scheme, as well as semi-structured interviews with service deliverers and policymakers. By comparing perspectives across social prescribing, I will explore tensions between its intentions and its effects in practice. This research contributes to the emerging field of biosocial medical anthropology, which seeks to investigate how social experiences and exposures are embodied as health outcomes.