Photographs from the August 20th Discussion Forums
Read What People are Saying about the Carolina Summer Reading Program
Overview
The Carolina Summer Reading Program is designed to be a part of your Fall 2001 Orientation at the University of North Carolina. All incoming First Year and Transfer Students are required to participate by reading The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures by Anne Fadiman, and by participating in discussion sessions on August 20. The program is designed to prepare students for some of their first-year courses and to stimulate conversation inside and outside the classroom about social issues facing all of us today as we enter the new millennium.
On Monday, August 20th, from 1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m., students are required to contribute to small group discussions led by selected faculty and staff. This is an opportunity for you to connect with members of Carolina's learning community and to share a common academic experience with your new peers.
The Book
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down explores urgent yet painful questions of medical ethics and cultural difference. It tells the story of Lia Lee, the child of Hmong immigrants from Laos, who was born with severe, life-threatening epilepsy. Relating the tragedy of Lia, her parents, and her doctors with skill and compassion for all involved, Anne Fadiman explores the radically different notions of disease that divided the Hmong sense of health and disease from the views of American scientific medicine. The resulting conflict left behind heartbreak and bitterness and raises pressing questions for all thoughtful citizens. Is there such a thing as "too much" cultural difference? How can science coexist respectfully with competing conceptions of the universe? What should be the role of law in defining the best interests of children when parents and doctors disagree? Moving and tenderly written, Fadiman's work will engage readers intellectually, emotionally, and morally. |
The Author
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Related Resources
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Related Events |
Other UNC-Chapel Hill First Year Initiatives
First Year Initiative Theme Housing
First Year Seminars
2000 Carolina Summer Reading Program
1999 Carolina Summer Reading Program
Resources for Book Discussion Leaders
Guidelines for Discussion Leaders
General Pointers for Leading Book Discussions
The Carolina Summer Reading Program developed from recommendations made by the 1997 Chancellor's Task Force on Intellectual Climate to improve the first-year student orientation experience. For more information about the Carolina Summer Reading Program, read the program overview.
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Last revised: January 7, 2002
