Health in a Fragile State

Science, Sorcery, and Spirit in the Lower Congo
Erscheinungsjahr 2021
ISBN: 978-0-299-32504-6
Verlag: University of Wisconsin Press

Buch, Englisch, 288 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 229 mm

Reihe: Africa and the Diaspora: History, Politics, Culture

Based on extensive field research in the Manianga region of the Lower Congo, Health in a Fragile State is an anthropological account of public health and health care after the collapse of the Congolese state in the 1980s and 1990s. This work brings into focus John M. Janzen's earlier books on African health and healing, revealing the collaborative effort by local, national, and international agencies to create viable alternative institutions to those that represented the centralized state. This book documents and analyzes the realignment of existing institutions and the creation of new ones that shape health and healing.
Janzen explores the manner in which power and information, including science, are legitimized in the preservation and improvement of health. Institutional validity and knowledge empower citizens and health practitioners to gain the upper hand over the region's principal diseases, including malaria, tuberculosis, typhoid, and HIV/AIDS.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie | Volkskunde Ethnologie Kultur- und Sozialethnologie: Allgemeines
• Medizin | Veterinärmedizin Medizin | Public Health | Pharmazie | Zahnmedizin Medizin, Gesundheitswesen Public Health, Gesundheitsmanagement, Gesundheitsökonomie, Gesundheitspolitik
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Afrikanische Geschichte
• Medizin | Veterinärmedizin Medizin | Public Health | Pharmazie | Zahnmedizin Medizin, Gesundheitswesen Präventivmedizin, Gesundheitsförderung, Medizinisches Screening

Inhaltsverzeichnis

- List of Illustrations ix
- Preface and Acknowledgments xiii
- List of Abbreviations xvii
- Introduction 3
- Part I: A History of Population and Disease in the Lower Congo
- 1 Population Decline and Rise 41
- 2 Postcolonial Population and Disease Trends 65
- Part II: The Social Reproduction of Health
- 3 Health in Household, Family, and Clan 89
- 4 Public Health and Health Care Institutions, Reconfigured 109
- 5 Rejoicing in Our Bodies: Popular Meanings of Health 145
- Part III: The Legitimation of Power and Knowledge
- 6 Dumuna: Creating Authority from Below 159
- 7 Science, Sorcery, and Spirit 190
- 8 Legitimation and Disease Control 214
- Conclusion 229
- Notes 235
- Bibliography 243
- Index 251

Über Autor(innen)

John M. Janzen is a professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of Kansas. He is the author of The Quest for Therapy in Lower Zaire; Lemba, 1650–1930: A Drum of Affliction in Africa and the New World; Ngoma: Discourses of Healing in Central and Southern Africa; and many articles on health, healing, religion, and society in Central Africa and the Atlantic diaspora.