Medical anthropology attempts to understand human illness and the techniques used in diagnosis and healing in all the diverse ways that they are understood and practised across the world's communities. In ecological anthropology, biocultural approaches are those that explicitly recognize the dynamic interactions between humans as biological beings and the social, cultural and physical environments they inhabit. Central to this is the understanding of human variability as a function of responsiveness to social, cultural and physical environments. Current formulations of bioculturalism privilege neither culture nor biology, and unlike sociobiology, do not seek to understand the evolutionary basis of human behaviour and culture. Rather, localized and measurable human biological outcomes are examined in relation to aspects of history, politics and economics, while past evolutionary outcomes are viewed as forming the genetic basis for biological responses to interactive physical, social and biological stresses in the present.

The biocultural approach to health and disease forms the basis of ecological medical anthropology, and this is where this volume is positioned. The authors wrote this text because of dissatisfaction with existing texts on the market, so it is worth noting what they do differently from them. After introducing their approach, the authors consider anthropological perspectives on health and disease, and healers and healing, both topics usually little discussed in ecological medical anthropology, but which are important for a considered overview. Subsequent chapters are more standard fare, considering diet and nutrition, growth and development, reproductive health, ageing, stress and social inequality, and mental health. Among these chapters is one on emerging infections, an essential category for understanding changing disease patterns in ecological context.

The book is loaded with case studies and examples, and each chapter ends with a small number of study questions. The final chapter discusses the relevance of medical anthropology to the world, and will be very useful for teachers of the discipline, since it has many of the most frequently asked questions. It is a teaching text, and its strength lies in bringing the full range of ecological medical anthropology within the covers of one book. It is interesting to read, and places the discipline in historical context. It is well written, and should become a standard text.