Not so "Traditional" Healing: Constructions of Illness Reality and Spirit Possession in a Rapidly Changing Society in Venda, South Africa

The present thesis "Not so 'Traditional' Healing: Constructions of Illness Reality and Spirit Possession in a Rapidly Changing Society in Venda, South Africa" aims to analyze socio-cultural and political aspects of 'traditional' healing which had been the focus of fieldwork of the author in 'Venda', South Africa (in the period between 2004-6). In the first section of the thesis the author has shown that the medical concepts and symbols marked as 'traditional' have not formed a closed, time-less system. On the contrary, they have reflected and shaped far-reaching socio-cultural changes in the post-apartheid dispensation characterised by the neo-liberal market reforms, congealing of socio-economic inequalities, transformations of gender identities and the politics of 'tradition' and identity. 'Traditional healing' has thus been constituted through a constant process of (re)invention of symbols and practices which have referred to the 'Venda past' while aiming to delineate boundaries of 'tradition' in relation to biomedicine. The second section of the thesis has focussed on the phenomenon of ancestor spirit possession which has also constituted the means through which 'traditional' healers have been recruited and their claims to knowledge and healing power have been legitimized. In contrast to the..