Henry Smits Lecture

“Illness and Identity: The Leper That Lurks in Us All”

Gerald G. Osborn, lecturer in philosophy, will present this lecture.

7-9 p.m.
March 8
Student Union Building Alumni Room


Philosophically, identity implies sameness, but paradoxically people maintain a sense of personal identity in the midst of lives changing constantly. Illness and injury can alter this abiding sense of sameness and can become an affront to people’s personal identity. In its most malignant form, the process becomes all-consuming and the person becomes their disease.

A psychiatrist, teacher and consultant, Osborn’s areas of research center on the interfaces between psychiatry and primary-care medicine and in medical ethics and history.

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