Beyond lay pharmacology: Fugitive, alternative, and pluralistic pharmacologies as collective practice

Magdalena Góralska, Anthony Rizk and Nayantara Sheoran Appleton

Chapter 31 in Handbook of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology Studies, 2026, pp 508-522 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter revisits the concept of lay pharmacology, highlighting its enactments beyond notions of individual misuse or deviation from biomedical norms. Lay pharmacology is approached here as a collective, situated, and creative practice through which individuals and communities make sense of pharmaceuticals in their everyday lives. Rather than positioning lay practices in opposition to expert pharmacology, the chapter highlights a multiplicity of pharmacologies that coexist, adapt, and respond to structural failures, institutional ruptures, and epistemic exclusions. Three ethnographic case studies serve to illustrate how collective forms of pharmaceutical knowledge and care emerge from people's everyday pharmacological enactments: (1) fugitive pharmacology illustrated through hormonal management in Aotearoa; (2) alternative pharmacology emerging amid pharmaceutical shortages in Lebanon; and (3) pluralistic pharmacology viewed through Lyme disease advocacy across Poland and the US. Recognizing the legitimacy and complexity of collective knowledge and action, the chapter responds to scholarly invitations to explore lay pharmacologies beyond individual users and argues for a broader, pluralistic, and more inclusive understanding of how pharmaceuticals are lived, negotiated, and made meaningful.

Keywords: Collective practices; Expertise; Fugitive science; Lay pharmacology; Tinkering; Wrangling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035338443
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