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Author Bierlich, Bernhard, 1963- author.

Title The problem of money : African agency and Western medicine in northern Ghana / Bernhard Bierlich
Published New York : Berghahn Books, 2007

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Description 1 online resource (xix, 228 pages) : illustrations, maps
Series Monographs in German history
Monographs in German history.
Contents List of Illustrations and Tables; Foreword; Preface Chapter 1. 'New' and Enduring Social and Economic Formations Continuity With the Past or 'Tradition' ; 1.1 The Land and the People; 1.2 History, Politics and Religion; 1.3 A Bilateral People?; 1.4 The Local Scene Negotiating the Future and the Global Economy ; 1.5 Women in a Male-Oriented Society; 1.6 Women, the Household and the Economy Chapter 2. Powers of the Person ; 2.1 The Individual and the Sway of Maternal Kinship; 2.2 The Morality of Witchcraft and Medicines: The Contrast of Legitimacy and Gender; 2.3 Enchanted Modernity and Witchcraft Chapter 3
Basic Concepts of Health and Illness ; 3.1 Illness: The Environment, the Living and the Dead; 3.2 Common Illness; 3.3 Ideas about the Body, Heart, Stomach and Common Symptoms; 3.4 What is Illness?; 3.5 Diagnosing Symptoms; 3.6 Protection and the Occult Chapter 4. Medicines, Modernity and Commoditization ; 4.1 What is Medicine?; 4.2 Tim; 4.3 Images of Medicines; 4.4 Classification of Medicines; 4.5 Naming Medicines; 4.6 Plants, Western Pharmaceuticals and Islamic Medicines; 4.7 Treatment Choices: Magical and Non-Magical Medicines; 4.8 Medicines, Modernity and Commoditization; 4.9 A Note on the Provision of Medical Care in the Nineties Chapter 5
The Herbalist, Medical Pluralism and the Cultural Patterning of Illness ; 5.1 The Local Curer and His Plants; 5.2 The Cultural Construction of Medical Knowledge: Becoming a Herbalist; 5.3 Medical Pluralism in Dagomba; 5.4 Biopower and the Cultural Patterning of Illness; 5.5 Medical Knowledge and Medical Culture Chapter 6. Health, Wealth and Magic ; 6.1 Health, Wealth and Magic; 6.2 The Modernity of Divination: The Power of Lotteries Chapter 7. A Woman's Lot: the Practical Realities of Care ; 7.1 The Dominant Voice: Men's Control of Local Medicines; 7.2 The Structure of the Quest for Medicine: 'Begging for Medicine'; 7.3 Ideology and Practice: Women, the Future and Decision Making; 7.4 The Ethics of Care and the Female Strategy of Child Care Chapter 8
The Problem of Money: Money and Medicine ; 8.1 Introduction; 8.2 Wealth, Health and the Community; 8.3 Monetary and Non-Monetary Transactions in Dagomba; 8.4 Contexts of Curing or the Problem of Money in Medicine; 8.5 'Money Spoils the Medicine'; 8.6 The (Im)morality of Medicines: Medicine-Sellers and Drug Peddlers; 8.7 'Money Spoils the Medicine': Ideology and Practice; 8.8 'Money Spoils the Medicine' Revisited; 8.9 Healing and 'The Problem of Money' Conclusion Appendices ; 1. The Burden of Illness; 2. Patterns of Medicine Use References; Glossary; Index
Summary "Based on long-term medical anthropological research in northern Ghana, the author analyses issues of health and healing, of gender, and of the control and use of money in a changing rural African setting. He describes the culture of medical pluralism, typical for neo-colonial states, and people's choices of 'traditional' (local) medicine (plants and sacrifices), Islamic medicine (charms and various written solutions) and 'modern' therapy (biomedicine, in particular western pharmaceuticals). He concludes that the rural-urban divide is a fiction, linked by a postcolonial, capitalist discourse of local markets, regional economies and national structures, which frequently emerge in local African settings but often originate in global and multinational markets."--Jacket
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 195-212) and index
Notes Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002. http://purl.oclc.org/DLF/benchrepro0212 MiAaHDL
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English
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Subject Medical anthropology -- Ghana -- Dagomba
Traditional medicine -- Ghana -- Dagomba
Medical innovations -- Economic aspects -- Ghana -- Dagomba
Medical innovations -- Social aspects -- Ghana -- Dagomba
Social change.
Magic.
Medicine, African Traditional
Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice
Socioeconomic Factors
Interpersonal Relations
Social Change
Magic
illusion (performing art)
magic (occult science)
BUSINESS & ECONOMICS -- Economics -- General.
Social change
Magic
Manners and customs
Medical anthropology
Medical innovations -- Economic aspects
Medical innovations -- Social aspects
Traditional medicine
Dagomba
Interkulturalität
Kulturübertragung
Marktmacht
Medizinische Versorgung
Volksmedizin
Ethnomedizin
SUBJECT Dagomba (Ghana) -- Social life and customs
Ghana
Subject Ghana -- Dagomba
Dagomba.
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2007047612
ISBN 9781782388739
1782388737