Author: Vonarx, Nicolas

Source: Anthropology in Action, Volume 14, Number 3, Winter 2007 , pp. 18-29(12)

Publisher: Berghahn Journals

Abstract:

Anthropological research concerning the relationship between Haitian vodou and illness shows that vodou practitioners' explanatory models of illness contain two levels of causality. One presents the sick as victims of magical-religious procedures and illness as being the result of agents directed at the victims. The meanings for the origins of such illnesses are rooted in Haitian social reality, which Haitians perceive as dangerous and threatening. A certain representation of self and social reality underlies these illness models in vodou and in vodou-inspired Haitian folk knowledge. An anthropological analysis of illness must identify local meanings that may shed light on certain cultural constructions of illness, as can be achieved by examining explanatory models structured around origins, causes, disease agents and other sources of illness found in Haiti. But the analysis must go beyond local meanings and question the representation of self and of social reality that goes along with these models and makes them intelligible for Haitians. In doing so, we note that this representation is the result of a process of subjectivation that is bound up in power relations between Haiti and the West. A cultural approach to explanatory models of illness in vodou is incomplete without a critical anthropological approach that addresses the relations of domination to which Haiti has been subjected. This article draws on these two anthropological perspectives in analysing illness in Haiti. It demonstrates how a meaning-oriented micro-social analysis of illness can be combined with a critical, macro-social approach in medical anthropology.

Keywords: VONARX; HAITIAN VODOU; ILLNESS; LOCAL MEANINGS; PROCESS OF SUBJECTIVATION AND DOMINATION

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3167/aia.2007.140304

Publication date: 2007-12-01

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• Anthropology in Action is a peer-reviewed journal publishing key articles, commentaries, research reports, and book reviews that deal with the use of anthropology in all areas of policy and practice. Recent themes have included identity and movement, anthropology in Denmark, the effects of ethics, and anthropology and activism. Subjects covered by the journal include organizations, HIV/AIDS research, new reproductive technologies, the rights of indigenous peoples, community care and social policy, health, medicine and suffering, education and government policy, museums, place and space, management, ethnicity and violence, and overseas development.
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