Jefferson Humanities & Health Programs

Tuesday, September 15, 12-1PM, Eakins Lounge, Jefferson Alumni Hall. Lunch provided while supplies last. Open to all.

Shanda McManus, MD, grew up in Philadelphia and has practiced family medicine for over twenty years. Dr. McManus received her B.A. in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.D. from Sidney Kimmel Medical College. She is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine at Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine, where she champions the practice of Narrative Medicine. Dr. McManus writes about the intersection of life, race, and was privileged to be a 2021 PEN America Emerging Voices fellow. Her debut memoir, Brother Epistles, is an epistolary work — a series of intimate letters to her brother Monir, killed in Philadelphia while she was a first-year medical student at Jefferson.

Three decades later, Dr. McManus traces Monir's life through their shared upbringing in North Philadelphia, his teen fatherhood, his time in the U.S. Army, and finally, his participation in the drug trade — writing always as both sister and physician. Braiding grief, memory, social commentary, and collective history, Brother Epistles asks what it means to bear witness to Black life, loss, and survival from inside both a family and a white coat. The book laments the fragility of Monir's life while demanding an American reckoning for the socioeconomic structures responsible for so many young Black men dying through homicide. Leavened with humor, family love, and unconquerable Black joy, it is a heartbreaking and powerful meditation on Black identity, the criminalization of Black boys, and the devastating ripple effects of loss on the loved ones left behind.

During 2026-2027, the Jefferson Humanities Forum hosts multidisciplinary scholars and thinkers to investigate the theme of Movement.

Co-presented by Jefferson Humanities & Health, the Philadelphia University Honors Institute at Thomas Jefferson University, and the College of Humaniteis & Sciences

For more information, email Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator, Student Affairs.

Monday, September 21, 12-1PM, Bluemle LIfe Science Building, Room 107. Lunch provided. Opent o Jefferson students, faculty, and staff.

In this Anti-Racism in Health Focus discussion, learn to define microaggressions and the steps one can take to disarm their effects.

A microaggression is an unintentional and unconscious action that can negatively affect our day-to-day human interactions. They cause real harm to individuals. There is a large amount of evidence that it can be a major factor in the creation of disparities in the healthcare environment that can ultimately lead to patient-care disparities. In this session, we will define microaggressions, its documented effects in medicine, the concept of silent collusion, and the steps one can take to disarm the effects of microaggression.

At the end of the session, the attendees will be able to

• Define microaggressions.

• Give two examples of how microaggressions affect the patient care environment.

• Define “silent collusion.”

• Name at least three techniques to address a witnessed microaggression.

Facilitator: Bernard L. Lopez, MD, MS, CPE, FACEP, FAAEM, Associate Provost for Diversity and Inclusion, Thomas Jefferson University.

Questions? Contact Kirsten Bowen, HUmaniteis Program Coordinator.

Wednesday, September 23, 4-5PM, DEC Forum, Lawrence N. Field DEC Center, 4201 Henry Avenue, Philadelphia. Open to all.

Shanda McManus, MD, grew up in Philadelphia and has practiced family medicine for over twenty years. Dr. McManus received her B.A. in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.D. from Sidney Kimmel Medical College. She is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine at Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine, where she champions the practice of Narrative Medicine. Dr. McManus writes about the intersection of life, race, and was privileged to be a 2021 PEN America Emerging Voices fellow. Her debut memoir, Brother Epistles, is an epistolary work — a series of intimate letters to her brother Monir, killed in Philadelphia while she was a first-year medical student at Jefferson.

Three decades later, Dr. McManus traces Monir's life through their shared upbringing in North Philadelphia, his teen fatherhood, his time in the U.S. Army, and finally, his participation in the drug trade — writing always as both sister and physician. Braiding grief, memory, social commentary, and collective history, Brother Epistles asks what it means to bear witness to Black life, loss, and survival from inside both a family and a white coat. The book laments the fragility of Monir's life while demanding an American reckoning for the socioeconomic structures responsible for so many young Black men dying through homicide. Leavened with humor, family love, and unconquerable Black joy, it is a heartbreaking and powerful meditation on Black identity, the criminalization of Black boys, and the devastating ripple effects of loss on the loved ones left behind.

The Honors Literary Salon will discuss Brother Epistles for the Fall 2026 semester. Interested students should check the Honors Canvas site for more information about book pickup, dates, and cornerstone eligibility.

During 2026-2027, the Jefferson Humanities Forum hosts multidisciplinary scholars and thinkers to investigate the theme of Movement.

Co-presented by Jefferson Humanities & Health, the Philadelphia University Honors Institute at Thomas Jefferson University and the College of Humanities & Sciences.

For more information, email Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator..

Friday, October 2, 12-1PM, BLSB 107. Lunch provided. Open to Jefferson students, faculty and staff.

In this Anti-Racism in Health Focus talk, learn how Africans, Arabs, and East Asians laid the foundation for modern immunizations.

In the early eighteenth century, European medical practitioners and slave owners learned of smallpox inoculation from West Africans and Arabs for the first time. They quickly appropriated the practice to control the spread of smallpox along Atlantic slave trading routes throughout Europe, West Africa, and the Americas. They used inoculation to protect their families, safeguard colonial settlements, and expand the slave trade and slavery. Nevertheless, Africans and their descendants continued to perform inoculations in contexts where slavery and colonialism constantly threatened their social ties. In the process, people of African descent imbued inoculation with new significance as they struggled to maintain authority over the practice and protected and reaffirmed their communities’ intergenerational ties to place, ancestry, and kin.

Presenter: Dr. Elise A. Mitchell is a historian of the early modern Black Atlantic in the Department of History at Swarthmore College.

Questions? Contact Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator. 

Tuesday, October 13, 12-1PM, Jefferson Alumni Hall, Room 207. Lunch provided. Open to Jefferson students, faculty, and staff.

Join us for Our Words Matter: A Guide to Reducing Stigma and Bias in Clinical Communication, facilitated by Dr. Megan Healy, MD, Professor, Clinical Emergency Medicine, Assistant Program Director, Emergency Medicine Residency, Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University.

Dr. Healy will review best practices in patient-centered languate to reduce stigma, improve the patient-physician alliance, and advance health equity.

Questions? Contact Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator..

Monday, October 19, 12-1PM, Jefferson Alumni Hall, Room 207. Lunch provided. Open to Jefferson students, faculty and staff.

How does racism affect all aspects of the Social Determinants of Health and what are Philadelphia's health outcomes by neighborhood?

The Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) play a significant role in individual and population health outcomes. SDOH is affected by many factors. One factor is racism as it affects all aspects of SDOH. In this session, we’ll define racism, examine its history as it relates to the social determinants of health, and examine the city of Philadelphia’s health outcomes by neighborhood. 

Objectives – at the end of the session, learners will be able to: 

Define the institution of racism and its many forms, including structural racism 

List 5 components of the Social Determinants of Health 

Discuss the importance of structural competency 

Discuss examples of structural racism’s effects as a barrier to health equity 

Facilitator: Bernard L. Lopez, MD, MS, CPE, FACEP, FAAEM, Associate Provost for Diversity and Inclusion, Thomas Jefferson University.

Questions? Contact Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator.

Monday, November 9, 12-1PM, Hamilton Room 505. Lunch provided. Open to Jefferson students, faculty and staff.

In this Anti-Racism in Health Focus discussion, learn to define the concept of race, the institution of racism, and race-based medicine.

In this Anti-Racism in Health Focus introduction to the history of racism in medicine, participants will learn to

• Define the concept of race
• Define the institution of racism and its many forms including structural racism
• List 3 specific examples of racism in medicine
• Explain race-based medicine and describe examples of how it contributes to structural racism

Facilitator: Bernard L. Lopez, MD, MS, CPE, FACEP, FAAEM, Associate Provost for Diversity and Inclusion, Thomas Jefferson University.

Questions? Contact Kirsten Bowen, Humanities Program Coordinator.