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Health, healing and disease in South African township
Intwaso is a condition which has been the subject of a great deal of psychological and psychiatric research over the past 50 years. Rarely have researchers rooted their interpretations within the social context, at either a micro or macro level. In this thesis it is argued that these omissions have...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English English |
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Social Anthropology
2025
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| _version_ | 1867614475101667328 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Mills, Janet |
| author2 | West, M |
| author_browse | Mills, Janet West, M |
| author_facet | West, M Mills, Janet |
| author_sort | Mills, Janet |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Intwaso is a condition which has been the subject of a great deal of
psychological and psychiatric research over the past 50 years. Rarely
have researchers rooted their interpretations within the social context,
at either a micro or macro level. In this thesis it is argued that
these omissions have resulted in a misunderstanding of the very nature·
of the process of intwaso. This project therefore aims to both remedy
and re-approach a study of the condition by locating it within a range
of other illness-episodes suffered by household-members. Secondly, a
particular illness, tuberculosis will be used as a control in order to
establish the social determinants of differing patient-family prophylactic
measures and therapy-management. This is of central importance to an
understanding of intwaso as some social contexts create circumstances
in which ancestral possession is the explanation for successive illnessepisodes and misfortunes.
An understanding of the social recognition or non-recognition of intwaso,
the initiation into and functioning of a diviner-school is also of
importance to an understanding of the process of intwaso. The schools
are seen as being shaped in response to the structural stresses of living
in a South African township.
The initial approach adopted in this thesis is to give a wide-angled
"focusing shot" of the conditions and way of life of Guguletu residents,
before honing in on a re-analysis of intwaso. The central tenet of
this thesis is that without contextualization, a distorted interpretation
of intwaso is inevitable, because the construction of the research design
rules out the possibility of seeing the co-incidental nature of the
condition. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/41181 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | English eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:52:37.853Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| publishDateRange | 2025 |
| publishDateSort | 2025 |
| publisher | Social Anthropology |
| publisherStr | Social Anthropology |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/41181 Health, healing and disease in South African township Mills, Janet West, M Medical anthropology - Cape of Good Hope - Guguletu</td></tr><tr><td class= Intwaso is a condition which has been the subject of a great deal of psychological and psychiatric research over the past 50 years. Rarely have researchers rooted their interpretations within the social context, at either a micro or macro level. In this thesis it is argued that these omissions have resulted in a misunderstanding of the very nature· of the process of intwaso. This project therefore aims to both remedy and re-approach a study of the condition by locating it within a range of other illness-episodes suffered by household-members. Secondly, a particular illness, tuberculosis will be used as a control in order to establish the social determinants of differing patient-family prophylactic measures and therapy-management. This is of central importance to an understanding of intwaso as some social contexts create circumstances in which ancestral possession is the explanation for successive illnessepisodes and misfortunes. An understanding of the social recognition or non-recognition of intwaso, the initiation into and functioning of a diviner-school is also of importance to an understanding of the process of intwaso. The schools are seen as being shaped in response to the structural stresses of living in a South African township. The initial approach adopted in this thesis is to give a wide-angled "focusing shot" of the conditions and way of life of Guguletu residents, before honing in on a re-analysis of intwaso. The central tenet of this thesis is that without contextualization, a distorted interpretation of intwaso is inevitable, because the construction of the research design rules out the possibility of seeing the co-incidental nature of the condition. 2025-03-14T11:46:18Z 2025-03-14T11:46:18Z 1983 2025-03-14T11:36:17Z Thesis / Dissertation Masters MA http://hdl.handle.net/11427/41181 en eng application/pdf Social Anthropology Faculty of Humanities University of Cape Town |
| spellingShingle | Medical anthropology - Cape of Good Hope - Guguletu</td></tr><tr><td class= Mills, Janet Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| title_full | Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| title_fullStr | Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| title_full_unstemmed | Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| title_short | Health, healing and disease in South African township |
| title_sort | health healing and disease in south african township |
| topic | Medical anthropology - Cape of Good Hope - Guguletu</td></tr><tr><td class= |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/41181 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT millsjanet healthhealinganddiseaseinsouthafricantownship |