Medical anthropology

388 Pages·2017·5.67 MB·English

UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository)
Medical anthropology: essays and reflections from an Amsterdam graduate
programme
van der Geest, S.; Gerrits, T.; Challinor, J.
Publication date
2014
Document Version
Final published version
Link to publication
Citation for published version (APA):
van der Geest, S., Gerrits, T., & Challinor, J. (2014). Medical anthropology: essays and
reflections from an Amsterdam graduate programme. (Health, culture and society). AMB.
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This volume is a collection of twenty articles by graduates of the Amsterdam & MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Master’s in Medical Anthropology (AMMA) at the University of Amsterdam. soc
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The university is known for outstanding and innovative work in the field ty
of medical anthropology and a teaching approach that combines a strong
essays and reflections from an
ethnographic basis with thorough theoretical grounding.

amsterdam graduate programme
More than two hundred students from across the world graduated from
the AMMA programme, which resulted in a global network of medical
anthropologists working in a wide range of positions in their respective
societies. When the AMMA programme ended in 2012, some staff and
alumni decided to mark the occasion by publishing a book with essays and
information about the AMMA programme, which resulted in this edited
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volume. All contributions are based on the authors’ exemplary master theses
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and provide a glimpse of the diversity of the students’ backgrounds, interests, D
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fieldwork and theoretical approaches. The articles address experiences C
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of health and illness, sexuality, violence, drug use, local healing, body and L

embodiment, children’s perspectives on health and body, self-harm, gender, A
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obesity, autism, older people, nurses and homecare, reproductive decision-
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making, parenthood, HIV/AIDS, treatment choices, hospital ethnography, H
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meditation, body techniques, intersubjectivity, illness vocabularies, and O
hygiene and dirt. The essays are organized in seven themes: Wellness and P
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Illness, Treatment and Efficacy, Gender and Parenthood, Care and Autonomy, L
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Children’s Worlds, Body and Subjectivity, and Research and Theory. This G
collection of essays responds to a growing interest in ethnographic fieldwork Y
as a didactic tool in learning qualitative research methodology and self-
reflection. The reader will find inspiration from the articles and evidence of
the critical importance of a medical-anthropological approach to investigating
health and illness in any setting worldwide.
Sjaak van der Geest was lecturer and dean of the AMMA programme at the
University of Amsterdam.
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AMB AMB
MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Published in this series:

Anja Krumeich
The blessings of motherhood. Health, pregnancy and child care in Dominica
Sjaak van der Geest, Paul ten Have, Gerhard Nijhof, Piet Verbeek-Heida (red.)
De macht der dingen. Medische technologie in cultureel perspectief
Cor Hoffer
Islamitische genezers en hun patiënten. Gezondheidszorg, religie en zingeving
Peter Ventevogel
Whiteman’s things. Training and detraining healers in Ghana
Ria Reis
Sporen van ziekte. Medische pluraliteit en epilepsie in Swaziland
Anne Reeler
Money and friendship. Modes of empowerment in Thai Health Care
Joke Haafkens
Rituals of silence. Long-term tranquilizer use by women in the Netherlands
Michael Tan
Good medicine:
Pharmaceuticals and the construction of power and knowledge in the Philippines
Sylvie Fainzang
Of malady and misery. An African perspective on European illness
Marian Potting
Van je familie... Zorg, familie en sekse in de mantelzorg
Jessica Mesman
Ervaren pioniers. Omgaan met twijfel in de intensive care voor pasgeborenen
Robert Pool
Dialogue and the interpretation of illness. Conversations in a Cameroon village
Sjaak van der Geest & Ria Reis (eds.)
Ethnocentrism. Reflections on medical anthropology
Winny Koster
Secret strategies. Women and abortion in Yoruba society, Nigeria
Shahaduz Zaman
Broken limbs, broken lives. Ethnography of a hospital ward in Bangladesh
Francine van den Borne
Trying to survive in times of poverty and aids. Women and multiple partner sex in Malawi
Helle Max Martin
Nursing contradictions. Ideals and improvisation in Uganda
Miranda van Reeuwijk
Because of temptations: Children, sex and hiv/aids in Tanzania
Rebekah Park & Sjaak van der Geest (eds.)
Doing and living medical anthropology. Personal reflections
HEALTH, CULTURE and SOCIETY
STUDIESin MEDICALANTHROPOLOGYand SOCIOLOGY

MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY

ESSAYS AND REFLECTIONS FROM AN AMSTERDAM GRADUATE PROGRAMME

SJAAK VAN DER GEEST
TRUDIE GERRITS
JULIA CHALLINOR
(editors)

AMB
Diemen
2014
This book is dedicated to all AMMA teachers and alumni (1997-2012)

ISBN 97890 79700 65 3
© 2014, Amsterdam - Sjaak Van Der Geest, Trudie Gerrits, Julia Challinor – The Authors

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage and
retrieval system, without a written permission of the copyright owner.

Cover: Van Marum Graphics
Cover picture: Ogi inspecting a flat tire in Bosnia by Selma Tanovic.
“Ogi suddenly stopped: he saw a parked car, an old and ragged abandoned VW Golf 2. His
eyes sparkled in amusement. He approached it slowly, walked several times around it, as it
was a precious art piece in a museum. He touched the half blown tires on its wheels, its
rusted bumpers, and its broken door handles. Then he pressed his nose and his cheek to a
dirty window, inspecting the interior. This was what he did every time he saw a car that he
liked.” (An excerpt from Selma Tanovic’s fieldnotes),

Series lay-out design: Hanneke Kossen †, Amsterdam

AMB Publishers, P.O. Box 7, 1110 AA DIEMEN, The Netherlands – www.amb-press.nl
Table of contents

Preface by ANITA HARDON ix
AMMA’s Logo by SJAAK VAN DER GEEST xi
Introduction: Essays in Medical Anthropology and the AMMA experience 1
by SJAAK VAN DER GEEST, TRUDIE GERRITS, JULIA CHALLINOR, & RIA REIS

 Wellness and Illness
SANJAY AGGARWAL 15
A ‘Gay Paradise’? Exploring adverse mental health outcomes among gay
men in the Netherlands
MICHELLE ALLPORT 29
Women’s suffering: Teaching psychological violence in Mexico City
ALICE LAROTONDA 43
The ‘imperfect child’: Parents’ expectations disrupted by the birth of an
infant with a rare disease
NAVARAJ UPADHAYA 55
Nepalese adolescents’ perspectives on local vocabulary, types and
meanings of distress
NGUYEN TRAN LAM 67
Injecting drug users and sexual relationships in Vietnam

 Treatment and Efficacy
SASITORN CHAIPRASITTI 87
Body and bone: Cultural embodiment in Northern Thai bone healing
SARA BREWER 105
An anti-addiction drug? Reflections on efficacy and safety issues within
the Ibogaine subculture

 Gender and Parenthood
MONICA RODRIGUEZ GARCIA 121
“HIV-positive women shouldn’t make children just like that.” When a
right becomes ‘acceptable but not advisable’ in Maputo, Mozambique
MARIANA RIOS SANDOVAL 135
Practicing engaged fatherhood: Conversations with men in Mexico City
 Care and Autonomy
MARÍA FERNANDA OLARTE SIERRA 147
Between patient, doctor and machine: Nursing in a Dutch intensive care
unit
DAVID KYADDONDO 161
Controlled freedom: Contradictions in the ideals and practices of Dutch
home-care nurses
BARBARA HAHN 177
“Now I want to look after myself.” An ethnographic account of elderly
women’s reasons for moving to an old-age home in Kerala, India

 Children’s Worlds
MARIETTE DERWIG 195
“Being fat is more a social problem than a health problem.” Giving voice
to children with overweight
MAISIE DAGAPIOSO 205
Moving on. Street children, agency and well-being in Mindanao, the
Philippines: Twelve years after the research
MIRANDA VAN REEUWIJK 223
Children’s ideas and practices concerning hygiene and disease transmission:
Exploration in a rural town in Benin

 Body and Subjectivity
SELMA TANOVIC 241
The body as a mediator of intersubjectivity in children with autism: A
qualitative phenomenological study in Sarajevo, Bosnia
ZOE GOLDSTEIN 257
Inside out: Some thoughts on issues related to self-harm and young people’s
experience of their bodies
NASIMA SELIM 265
What does sitting have to do with the self? Body techniques, personhood
and well-being in Vipassana meditation

 Research and Theory
JULIA CHALLINOR 285
Teacher / paediatric nurse becomes medical anthropologist: Outsider and
mistrusted
SERA L. YOUNG 295
Critical Ecological Medical Anthropology: Selecting and applying theory
to anaemia during pregnancy on Pemba, Zanzibar
 In memory of
Pieter Streefland 333
Els van Dongen 335
Lily Zakiah Munir 339

 Appendices
List of AMMA students by year of course 345
Group pictures 1997-2012 348
List of teachers 356
List of all theses 357

Index 373