Competence for Citizenship by Gitte Beckmann
White ants are a delicacy in the subregion Acholi in northern Uganda. Since fresh ones are available only once a year when they become flying roamers, one 100-kg…
Tag: Africa
Vampires, Cannibals, and Sorcerers on the Loose by Warwick Anderson
On February 8, 2019, a symposium organized by Nancy Rose Hunt on the scholarship and career of Luise White was held at the University of Florida. In the…
When Women’s Laughter Keeps Men in Line
Among the Mbendjele gathering-hunting people who live in the Republic of Congo, “women’s laughter manages to keep men in line.” Drawing from ethnographic research by Jerome Lewis, anthropo…
Care in the middle voice by Tyler Zoanni
When thinking about care, it is easy to assume an asymmetrical structure with two fixed two roles: the care-giver and the cared-for. It is likewise easy to assume…
Lifetimes by Susan Reynolds Whyte
“It’s only Veria who can bathe our old mama,” remarked mama’s daughter-in-law with gentle amusement. “Because Veria is blind. You know how modest mama is. She doesn’t want…
Different Shades of White: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Albinotic Body – Conference Report
Hide Press Release (2 Less Words) Christopher Hohl Several phenomena have contributed to the increased attention paid to albinism in the past decade. The terrible atrocities inflicted on…
“Radical Bricoleurs”: On Doing Science, Community Life, Activism and Bureaucracy in Mozambique
By Anselmo Matusse, University of Cape Town § One day I was walking with Mr. Angelo, 69 years old, a former Renamo soldier, demobilized in 1994, who is now…
Exploring anthropologies of medicine and health across borders at 4S 2018 by Aadita Chaudhury
This year’s annual meeting for the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) had an intriguing new component: an exhibition on the histories of STS in flux internationally,…
Fed up security officers and drunk policemen in Nairobi by Francesco Colona
Greenwoods is a neighbourhood in Nairobi, Kenya, dotted with diplomatic residences. At the time of my research on public-private assemblages of security provision and the reconfiguration of citizenshi…
Thinking with spirits by Kristine Krause
During my first visit to Ghana in 1998, I was involved in a research project that looked at possible co-operations between healers and psychiatric clinics. I stayed in…
Ghana, Electronic Waste, and the Circular Economy
By Tim Perkin As the demand for ICT increases worldwide, it is surprising how little is known about what happens to our electronic goods that are thrown away.…
Ramah McKay’s Medicine in the Meantime: The Work of Care in Mozambique by Britt Halvorson
Medicine in the Meantime: The Work of Care in Mozambique Ramah McKay Duke University Press, 2018, 256 pages The study of medical humanitarianism has grown tremendously in…
Great Ape Haters
Isaiah Nengo on racist tweets, evolutionary misconceptions, and his ancient ape skull discovery. In a tweet from 2013, Roseanne Barr called former United Nations National Security Advisor Susan…
The Power and Precarity of Global Health Partnerships by Clare Herrick
A recent issue of Medicine Anthropology Theory devoted to the critique of global health partnerships (GHPs) raises a question of great significance to many Somatosphere readers: ‘In real world…
#Review: Mobile Secrets
Information and communications technology (ICT) has been hailed as the holy grail of “transformational development”, the source of growing innovations (such as the sending of remittances through mobil…
#Review: Monrovia Modern
Monrovia Modern is a beautiful and perceptive book that describes the limitations and contradictions of architectural forms of political and urban imaginations in Monrovia. It will appeal to…
Naomi Haynes on her new book, Moving by the Spirit
https://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520294257 Interview by Jon Bialecki Jon Bialecki: The center of your ethnography is about the Prosperity Gospel’s economy of faith and social ambition in the…
Diagnosis where? Testing Pigs and Humans for T. solium cysticercosis in Uganda by Rebekah Thompson
Two live pigs being transported to a local butcher in Mukono district, Uganda Taenia solium is a zoonotic disease shared between humans and pigs. Humans become infected with…
The representation of Africa in Hollywood movie Black Panther.
By Rhoda Woets Almost every month, I join a small group of anthropologists from the VU to go to the movies. Last month, we went to the action…
Humanitarian diagnostics for sleeping sickness in Uganda by Jennifer Palmer
Map of sleeping sickness RDT availability (red dots) in the north-western region of Uganda hosting refugees from South Sudan. In 2015, the majority of refugees in this region…
Environmental Anthropology: An Anthropologist’s View of a Cove Cleanup
The curse of the anthropologist: finding culture everywhere in nature. Today, the neighborhood in which my husband and I now live hosted a cleanup in a nearby cove.…
Diagnostics without diagnosis: RDTs for Sleeping Sickness in Uganda by Shona Lee
Diagnosing sleeping sickness (also known as human African trypanosomiasis (HAT)) is complicated, requiring the alignment of clinical suspicion with serological, parasitological, and molecular confirm…
Laboratory capacity building and the open hardware movement by Louise Bezuidenhout
Through my work in African laboratories I am regularly made aware of the challenging equipment shortages faced by research laboratories in many low/middle-income countries (LMICs). This extends far…