Social history of medicine in Spain. Points of departure and directions for research

The development and extension of activities in the domain of the social his tory of medicine in Spain since the 1960s is reviewed. Attention is paid, f irst, to the institutional setting and theoretical background of this broad line of research, taking the perspective of the professionalization of the subject of the 'history of medicine' as an undergraduate discipline in the syllabus of the Faculties of Medicine. Secondly, four main directions for research are outlined, namely disease and society, health policies, health professions and gender and medicine, including critical attention to the pr incipal works, active authors, and working and narrative styles.