Suchergebnisse

Prologue 11. - Introduction 13. - 1.1 Aim and Outline of the Book 19. - Research at the Intersection of Debates 23. - 2.1 Medicine of the North, Medicine of the South 24. - 2.2 Medicalisation of Life 30. - 2.3 Managing Sickness, Managing Uncertainty 35. - 2.4 Inductive Approach to Authority and Resistance 39. - In Sickness and in Health: Biographical Studies 43. - 3.1 Background of Selecting Informants 43. - 3.2 Three Observers and Four Stories 49. - 3.3 Researcher's Dilemma: Mediating in Conflict Situations 53. - Shifts and Changes in Uncertain Times 59. - 4.1 Historical Overview: Resistance and Resilience 59. - 4.2 Basotho Cosmology and Societal Structure 62. - 4.3 Shifts and Changes in Production 65. - 4.4 Empowerment of Women 68. - 4.5 Young Women's Lives in Urban Lesotho 69. - 4.6 The Dominant Party: The Grammar of Social Interaction 78. - 4.7 The Subordinate Party: Silent Agents Who Keep Face 83. - 4.8 Marriage Proposal as Individual Decision 87. - 4.9 The Female Way of a Love Proposal 90. - Pregnancy: Navigating Between Conflicting Demands 95. - 5.1 Parental Authority and Ancestral Discontent 97. - 5.2 Teaching and Learning about Pregnancy 118. - 5.3 Female Clients in Biomedical Care 121. - 5.3.4 Counselling to the Point of Accepting 131. - 5.4 Authoritative Knowledge and the Control of Misfortune 134. - Delivery: "In between life and death" 143. - 6.1 Shifting Places 144. - 6.2 Option 1: The Safe Sanctuary 150. - 6.3 Option 2: Rural Health Centres 159. - 6.4 Option 3: Mafeteng Hospital Maternity Ward 162. - 6.5 Option 4: Giving Birth at the Traditional Clinic 175. - Options for Safe Infant Feeding 183. - 7.1 Global and Local Arguments in Infant Feeding 185. - 7.2 Social (Re-)integration of Mother and Child 195. - 7.3 Biomedical Options for HIV-positive Mothers 204. - 7.4 MaMapeli's Socially Safe Practice: Exclusive Breastfeeding 210. - 7.5 Leshome's Informed Decision-Making: Exclusive Replacement Feeding 213. - 7.6 Tselela's Struggle with Tradition, HIV and

Since the turn of the millennium, the African continent has been extremely active in producing African futures. These are part of the multiple non-western modernities existing simultaneously; modernities of revolution, reform, or restitution. This contribution adds to the debate by analysing four recent concepts along four axes: the representation of time and space, the initiators behind those four concepts, and the concepts' social inclusiveness. The paper first discusses the idea of the "African Renaissance," which has been proposed as official government policy in South Africa and has given shape to Pan-African political bodies. Second, "Afrotopia" is a term coined by the Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr that emphasises identity politics. Third, "Afropolitanism" proposes an "African-style" modernity as seen in the works of Achille Mbembe and Sarah Nuttall and is also likened to John and Jean Comaroff's writings on "Afromodernity." Finally, "Afrofuturism" emerged in relation to science fiction literature and digital visual arts and uses the virtual sphere to address an international audience.

Since the turn of the millennium, the African continent has been extremely active in producing African futures. These are part of the multiple non-western modernities existing simultaneously; modernities of revolution, reform, or restitution. This contribution adds to the debate by analysing four recent concepts along four axes: the representation of time and space, the initiators behind those four concepts, and the concepts' social inclusiveness. The paper first discusses the idea of the "African Renaissance," which has been proposed as official government policy in South Africa and has given shape to Pan-African political bodies. Second, "Afrotopia" is a term coined by the Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr that emphasises identity politics. Third, "Afropolitanism" proposes an "African-style" modernity as seen in the works of Achille Mbembe and Sarah Nuttall and is also likened to John and Jean Comaroff's writings on "Afromodernity." Finally, "Afrofuturism" emerged in relation to science fiction literature and digital visual arts and uses the virtual sphere to address an international audience.

Since the turn of the millennium, the African continent has been extremely active in producing African futures. These are part of the multiple non-western modernities existing simultaneously; modernities of revolution, reform, or restitution. This contribution adds to the debate by analysing four recent concepts along four axes: the representation of time and space, the initiators behind those four concepts, and the concepts' social inclusiveness. The paper first discusses the idea of the "African Renaissance," which has been proposed as official government policy in South Africa and has given shape to Pan-African political bodies. Second, "Afrotopia" is a term coined by the Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr that emphasises identity politics. Third, "Afropolitanism" proposes an "African-style" modernity as seen in the works of Achille Mbembe and Sarah Nuttall and is also likened to John and Jean Comaroff's writings on "Afromodernity." Finally, "Afrofuturism" emerged in relation to science fiction literature and digital visual arts and uses the virtual sphere to address an international audience.

During ethnographic research on HIV-positive pregnant women in Lesotho, I found myself confronted with conflicting narratives, but what we do know is that MaMeli's baby passed away the day after she gave birth in the hospital. Trying to reconstruct what had happened, I interviewed the young mother, her mother-in-law, a midwife, and a paediatrician. Their stories differed significantly from each other. Yet, despite the inconsistencies between them, they proved valuable for my study. Ethnographic storytelling can reveal an informant's present view on past occurrences and give insights into the social roles of narrator and audience. A narration always implies two time periods: the past situation as experienced (erzählte Zeit) and the situation now when the occurrence is being interpreted (Erzählzeit). Hence, whilst analysing the stories did not bring me any closer to understanding what had happened to the baby, an examination of the four versions taught me much about each narrator's present situation and how they related to each other. In other words, the different renderings of the event allowed an understanding of the hegemony of interpretation. I argue in this paper that contradictions in narratives are more a chance than a challenge for ethnographic writing. I call on anthropologists not to erase out inconclusive stories in their ethnographic data but to delve into them and to find plausible explanations for why it is not possible to achieve conclusive solutions.

An estimated 160,000 women of childbearing age in Lesotho are HIV positive (UN Children's Fund [UNICEF] 2010). To prevent the transmission of HIV from mother to child (PMTCT), antenatal care clinics test pregnant women for HIV and provide prevention counseling. PMTCT counseling includes information about medication in pregnancy, delivery procedures, and safe infant feeding. Regarding infant feeding, the WHO recommends either exclusive replacement feeding or exclusive breastfeeding; while the culturally normative practice is to combine breast milk with other food for the infant. Mixed feeding, however, increases the likelihood of HIV infection through breast milk. Women must balance the recommendations of healthcare workers with society's norms and the advice of their family, as well as cost and availability. Exclusive replacement feeding is too expensive for most families and against the cultural norm, while exclusive breastfeeding proves difficult to implement because of a lack of understanding of PMTCT recommendations among an infant's multiple caretakers. Collective child care is an important part of social integration and respect for elders makes it difficult for young women to risk conflict by rejecting familial advice for that of healthcare workers. Given these concerns, the authors examine safe infant feeding in the context of Lesotho's HIV epidemic.

In this special issue, we explore the pivotal role that the future as a social perception of time and temporality plays in dealings with uncertainty. There are four linkages between uncertainty and future, as the chapters in this special issue show: Firstly, visions of the future result from current and past interpretations of culturally embedded everyday lives. Secondly, a multitude of co-existing models of time is possible. Thirdly, actors adjust their visions of the future when present conditions change. Fourthly, present actions are directed towards a vision of the future which merely serves as a guideline rather than a potential reality. Thus, the temporality of people's actions and imagination in uncertain times is at the fore of this special issue exploring the unfolding tension between the immediate and the imagined, the actual and the perceived.

1. Introduction: Africa's Middle Classes in Critical Perspective; Tabea Scharrer, David O'Kane and Lena Kroeker -- Section 1: Rethinking Concepts of Middle Classes in Africa -- 2. Turning the Poor into Something More Inspiring: The Creation of the African Middle Class Controversy; Dominique Darbon -- 3. The Narrative of 'the African Middle Class' and its Conceptual Limitations; Dieter Neubert and Florian Stoll -- 4. Anthropology and Class in Africa: Challenges of the Past and Present -- Section 2: The Recurring Rise and Return of Middle Classes in Africa; David O'Kane and Tabea Scharrer -- 5. The Ghanaian Middle Class, Social Stratification, and Long-Term Dynamics of Upward and Downward Mobility of Lawyers and Teachers; Jan Budniok and Andrea Noll -- 6. The Nubians of Kibera 'Revisited': Detribalized Natives, Slum Dwellers, Middle class?; Johanna Sarre -- 7. Saving and Serving the Nation: HIV Politics and the Emergence of New Professional Classes in Botswana; Astrid Bochow -- Section 3: The Political Consequences of the Middle Classes.-8. Propertied Citizenship in a Township and Suburb in Johannesburg; Barbara Heer -- 9. Thinking Sierra Leone and Building a New Middle Class: Political Expression and Political Values at the University of Makeni; David O'Kane -- 10. African Middle Classes: Formation and Destabilizing Effects -- Section 4: Formation of Social Interconnections and Interdependencies; Jason Musyoka -- 11. Pathways into the Middle: Rites of Passage and Emerging Middle Classes in Namibia; Julia Pauli -- 12. Middle Class Approaches to Social Security in Kenya; Lena Kroeker -- 13. Middle Classes and 'Moderate Prosperity' in Rural Madagascar; Tsiry Andrianampiarivo -- 14. Afterword. The (Idea of) African Middle Classes: Theorizing from Africa; Rachel Spronk