A Plague of Paradoxes AIDS, Culture, and Demography in Northern Tanzania |
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| Author:
| Setel, Philip W. |
| Series title: | Worlds of Desire Ser. |
| ISBN: | 978-0-226-74886-3 |
| Publication Date: | Feb 2000 |
| Publisher: | University of Chicago Press
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| Book Format: | Paperback |
| List Price: | AUD $54.95 |
Book Description:
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Since recording its first AIDS cases in 1983, Tanzania has reported nearly 90,000 more to the World Health Organization--more than any other country in Africa. As AIDS spread, the devastating syndrome came to be known simply as
ugonjwa huo: "that disease." The AIDS epidemic has forced Africans to reflect upon the meaning of traditional ideas and practices related to sexuality and fertility, and upon modernity and biomedicine. In
A Plague of Paradoxes,...
More DescriptionSince recording its first AIDS cases in 1983, Tanzania has reported nearly 90,000 more to the World Health Organization--more than any other country in Africa. As AIDS spread, the devastating syndrome came to be known simply as ugonjwa huo: "that disease."
The AIDS epidemic has forced Africans to reflect upon the meaning of traditional ideas and practices related to sexuality and fertility, and upon modernity and biomedicine. In A Plague of Paradoxes, anthropologist Philip Setel observes Tanzania's Chagga people and their attempts to cope with and understand AIDS--the latest in a series of crises over which they feel they have little, if any, control.
Timely and well-researched, A Plague of Paradoxes is an extended case study of the most serious epidemic of the twentieth century and the cultural circumstances out of which it emerged. It is a unique book that brings together anthropology, demography, and epidemiology to explain how a particular community in Africa experiences AIDS.