Description
Berghahn Books Working with Spirit Experiencing Izangoma Healing in Contemporary South Africa 2008 Edition by Jo Thobeka Wreford
In the current model of health dispensation in South Africa there are two major paradigms, the spirit-inspired tradition of izangoma sinyanga and biomedicine. These operate at best in parallel, but more often than not are at odds with one another. This book, based on the author's personal experience as a practitioner of traditional African medicine, considers the effects of the absence of spirit in biomedicine on collaborative relationships. Given the unprecedented challenge of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the country, the author suggests that more cooperation is vital. Taking a critical look at the role of anthropology in this endeavor, she proposes the development of a "language of spirit" by means of which the spirit-inspired aetiology of izangoma sinyanga may be made comprehensible to academic scientists and applicable to medical interventions. The author discusses white izangoma in the context of current debates on healing and hybridity and insists that there exists a powerful role for izangoma in the realm of societal healing. Above all, the book constitutes a start in what the author hopes will develop into an ongoing intellectual conversation between traditional African healing, academe, and biomedicine in South Africa. Table of contents :- List of IllustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionGoing about it - Fields, sources and contributorsStructuring the bookChapter 1. Conversations in anthropological theory and methodActs of collaboration - Izangoma and HIV/AIDS interventions in East and Southern AfricaExperiential practice, reflexivity and a language for spiritMethodological issues and the notion of mimetic ethnographyChapter 2. On the Question of AncestorsConceiving ancestorsThe sacred pragmatism of Izangoma SinyangaChapter 3. Biomedicine and Izangoma sinyanga: Fundamental misunderstandings and avoidable mistakesMedical disjuncts in the time of AIDSProfessionalizing Izangoma - Government, HIV/AIDS, and the 'traditional' in South African medicineIndigenous discovery, pharmaceutical profitFurther contestations and uncomfortable predicamentsChapter 4. On 'Being Called' (Ukubiswa)Sickness and diagnosisAnswering 'the call'Ways of seeingDreams and stuffChapter 5. Graduation (Goduswa) and ancestral evidencesChapter 6. What got into you? Ancestral en-trancementWhat got into you?Not always bad: the literature of tranceHandling SpiritChapter 7. "Long-nosed Izangoma" and relationship issues in the Izangoma communityWorking with the whiteLong-nosed Izangoma?A place for the white?Chapter 8. Witchcraft and Izangoma Sinyanga in the time of AIDSVirtually modern, actually realUmbilical relationships and questions of motiveTreating AIDS, treating witchcraftPostscript and Final thoughtsGlossary of terms and acronymsReferencesIndex