What is the Difference Between Shame and Stigma?
When I speak to healthcare workers about shame, and why we need to understand shame and its effects, the question I hear most frequently is: “What’s the difference between shame and stigma?” Stigma has...
View ArticleExcerpt from ‘Out of Patients’
“Excerpt from Out of Patients: A Novel is published with permission from the University of Nevada Press.” Women go to physicians more than men. Partly that’s having a uterus, because menstrual...
View Article‘Researching Shame’ conference schedule released
The final schedule for our ‘Researching Shame’ conference on 5th June 2024 is now available. Please visit the event page for further information.
View ArticleShaming people is hurting, not helping our efforts to build a more equitable...
‘Shaming people is hurting, not helping our efforts to build a more equitable world’ Luna Dolezal discusses shame with Philippa Willitts for Now Then magazine Street art by Inksurgeon, on the...
View ArticleNEW CHAPTER: “The shameful dead: Vaccine hesitancy, shame and necropolitics...
Cooper, F., Dolezal, L., & Rose, A. (2024). “The shameful dead: Vaccine hesitancy, shame and necropolitics during COVID-19”. In Knowing COVID- 19. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press....
View ArticleHow permission to have shame can be a game changer
Probably the most recognised “antidote” to shame is compassion. Paul Gilbert who developed Compassion Focus Therapy originally created the model to apply to shame. Equally, Brené Brown created Shame...
View ArticlePeter Miller Seminar
The Shame and Medicine Project and the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health are pleased to welcome to the University of Exeter, Peter Miller, Professor of Violence Prevention and...
View ArticleFred Cooper Seminar
DATE: Hybrid 27th November 24, 13.00 – 14.00 GMT WATCH RECORDING TITLE: ‘Carmita Wood in her own words: Shame, loneliness, and epistemic injustice at a speak-out on sexual harassment in Ithaca in...
View ArticleIt’s a shame about shame research
I was honoured to be invited to the Researching Shame Conference in Birmingham on 5th June 2024 on account of research published more than a decade ago exploring whether shame is a concomitant of...
View ArticlePodcasts from The British Society for Phenomenology 2022 Annual Conference
Listen now to the BSP podcasts from The British Society for Phenomenology 2022 Annual Conference hosted by the University of Exeter which featured a special shame panel sponsored by Shame and Medicine...
View ArticleCongratulations
Congratulations to Luna Dolezal awarded a James Fellowship in Social Sciences SSSHARC at the University of Sydney for 2025.
View ArticlePersonal responsibility vs social determinants of health: how us GPs can...
I’ve enjoyed The BMJ’s focus on societal causes of ill health recently and Dr Lucinda Hiam et al’s article deeply resonated with me. Mainly because as a GP, I’ve always been troubled by my colleagues,...
View ArticleNew Article: ‘Shame-Sensitive Public Health: A Post Covid-19 Challenge’
Cooper, F., Dolezal, L. & Rose, A. Shame-Sensitive Public Health. J Med Humanit (2024).*~ Open Access. Abstract In this article, we argue that shaming interventions and messages during Covid-19...
View ArticleThe courage to blush: a story of shame, healing and psychological safety in...
The song of Hiawatha marked my first encounter with shame and the accompanying hot blush that would plague me for 20+ years. It’s strange how such a mundane situation can embed itself so deeply. Only...
View ArticleIs Shame so Bad? Distinguishing shame, guilt and embarrassment
My PhD research examines the harm of shame within NHS maternity wards. What I have discovered is that misunderstandings around how shame is experienced lead some healthcare professionals to suggest...
View ArticleCongratulations
Congratulations to Arthur Rose, Engaged Research Fellow for the Shame and Medicine Project, whose book ‘Asbestos – The Last Modernist Object’ has received the European Society for the Study of English...
View ArticleWelcome to our Visiting Scholars
We are delighted to welcome two Visiting Scholars to the Shame and Medicine Project. Dr Katharine Cheston and Prof Peter Miller. Read Katharine’s blog for the Shame and Medicine Project. Prof Peter...
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Call for Papers – Shame and Medicine 2025 Conference
For all details please visit our Conference event page.
View ArticleShame in the Third Person
That morning, the shouting pertained to a scan that the senior registrar said was needed for the very poorly elderly lady in Bed 7, whom the young doctor had been looking after for several days […] The...
View ArticleNew Graphic Medicine Piece
Vilkelyte, V., Dolezal, L., Navarro-Páez, J. et al. The Room. J Med Humanit (2024).* Open Access. We are delighted to share our latest Graphic Medicine piece ‘The Room’. Experiences of shame are...
View ArticleShame and Medicine in Literature Seminar Series
The Shame and Medicine Project presents the Shame and Medicine in Literature Seminar Series, hosted by the Centre for the Cultures and Environments of Health. Shame, Elspeth Probyn tells us, ‘is a...
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Shame and Medicine Conference
We are delighted to confirm that the end-of-project Shame and Medicine Conference will take place on Wednesday 11th and Thursday 12th June 2025 in the Woodbridge Suite, Reed Hall at the University of...
View ArticleReflections on my Chronic Shame
My life, like many other lives, has not always been easy. However, through sometimes painful reflection and not giving up I have managed to find satisfaction and contentment in many aspects of my life....
View Article‘Is it really an illness?’: The stigma of ‘medically unexplained symptoms’
I went for an eye test earlier this year. As the optician checked my details from my last appointment – and noticed, presumably, the words ‘PhD student’ next to ‘occupation’ – he asked what I was...
View ArticleBecoming My Own Master: Encouraging Myself, and Not My Shame, to Pull the...
The dim lights of the hospital room cast my patient in a soft glow. He was writhing on the hospital bed, crying out, “Mama, it hurts!” It was the middle of the night, and I was halfway through my...
View ArticleThe Choreographies of Tooth Shame
In September of last year, I had the privilege of presenting my initial findings on “tooth shame” at the Shame and Medicine Project and the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health. This...
View ArticleFeeling shame in shame research
Shame has been labelled and categorised in many ways in the literature. As a psychotherapist and researcher, for me, the most significant aspect of shame is that it is overwhelmingly painful and...
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Hope and Humanity – a storytelling event
Storytelling is an artform that all humans participate in and forms the cornerstone of medical practice. It can bring insight, peace and healing to both storyteller and audience. Healthcare staff most...
View ArticleNEW SEMINAR SERIES
Our Shame and Medicine In Literature seminar series starts with Dr Katharine Cheston on 15th Jan 25. Other speakers scheduled for 2025 are Veronica Heney (University of Durham), 12th Feb 25, and...
View ArticleCall for Papers – Shame and Medicine Conference – ends 31st January 2025
Call for Papers – Shame and Medicine 2025 Conference
View ArticleShame and Medicine Conference – Speakers announced
We delighted to announce the speakers at our June conference. Visit our event page for further details.
View ArticleShame
Understanding shame, the role shame can play at work and shame competence… Some of the topics discussed by Prof Luna Dolezal and Dr Will Bynum with co-hosts Dieter Declercq and Ian Sabroe on ‘Shame’...
View ArticleEMOTIONS IN MEDICINE, HEALTH AND WELLBEING
EMOTIONS IN MEDICINE, HEALTH AND WELLBEING Date: 21st August 2025 – In Person Registration details to follow This research symposium at the University of Sydney and co-organised with the Shame and...
View ArticleShame and Medicine Conference Programme
We’re delighted to share the full conference programme for the Shame and Medicine 2025 end-of-project conference, online and at the University of Exeter, 11-12 June 2025.
View ArticleNEW EXHIBITION
Shame and Medicine: The Lost Forest is the award-winning podcast series, produced by The Nocturnists in collaboration with the Shame and Medicine Project. This exhibition explores shame in the medical...
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Shame and Medicine: The Lost Forest Exhibition
Shame and Medicine: The Lost Forest is the award-winning podcast series, produced by The Nocturnists in collaboration with the Shame and Medicine Project. This exhibition explores shame in the...
View ArticleEating disorders and a different sort of shame
There are a lot of assumptions about shame and eating disorders. It is usually assumed that sufferers feel shame about not being thin enough or shame about eating. Whilst this is often the case, eating...
View ArticleThe Hidden Struggle: How Anxiety and Shame Shape Doctors’ Lives
It can begin in small, invisible ways. A flutter in the chest before ward rounds. A tightness in the throat before speaking up in meetings, the waves of nausea preparing to speak to a concerned...
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Shame in Healthcare Network & Conversation Series
As a project, we have spent a long time thinking about how best to harness the growing interest around shame in healthcare, and we’re excited to announce the formation of the Shame in Healthcare...
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Shame in Healthcare Network & Conversation Series
As a project, we have spent a long time thinking about how best to harness the growing interest around shame in healthcare, and we’re excited to announce the formation of the Shame in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Shame in Healthcare Network & Conversation Series
As a project, we have spent a long time thinking about how best to harness the growing interest around shame in healthcare, and we’re excited to announce the formation of the Shame in...
View ArticleShame and Medical History Seminar Series
The Shame and Medicine Project in collaboration with the Centre for Medical History at the University of Exeter, will run a seminar series over the next few years which will examine shame and stigma in...
View ArticleRECORDINGS FROM SHAME AND MEDICINE CONFERENCE
The recordings from the Shame and Medicine Conference, June 2025, are available to watch now: Wednesday 11th June AM Wednesday 11th June PM Thursday 12th June AM Thursday 12th June PM
View ArticleChange starts with us
I remember the first time a patient tried to talk to me about resuming sex following surgery: The words barely made it past her lips, her cheeks flushed. She was desperate to ask but was afraid of my...
View ArticleTrading Shame
I have been in such a deep and wonderful rabbit hole of shame since re-discovering the topic of shame in late 2024. I say re-discovering, because I first encountered the Shame and Medicine project in...
View ArticlePregnant Embodiment: Shame, Identity and Trauma
My PhD research seeks to explore the implications of the “good” birth which, since the Western feminist revival in the 1970s, has been conflated with the natural, unassisted birth. I argue that this...
View ArticleNEW PUBLICATION
Purwono, G. Y., Dolezal, L., Navarro-Páez, J., Wu, C. A., Bynum, W. & Bay, A., (2025) “Imposter”, Graphic Medicine Review. Open Access. We are delighted to share that Graphic Medicine Review has...
View ArticleNEW ARTICLE: Dental Shame: A Call for Understanding and Addressing the Role...
Folker L, Dolezal L, Jespersen AP, Paisi M, Withers L, Worle C, Øzhayat EB. Dental Shame: A Call for Understanding and Addressing the Role of Shame in Oral Health. Community Dent Oral Epidemiol. 2025...
View ArticleThe Crack That Lets the Light In: Learning from Mistakes
Years ago, time has somewhat lessened the sting, a patient of mine experienced a serious complication during an anaesthetic. I still hear his voice ringing through the ward: “What kind of doctor are...
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