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Alexander Rodlach. Witches, Westerners, and HIV: AIDS and Cultures of Blame in Africa.(Book review)
- Article from:
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Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft
- Article date:
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June 22, 2008
- Author:
- Luongo, Katherine
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Copyright informationCOPYRIGHT 2008 University of Pennsylvania Press. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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ALEXANDER RODLACH. Witches, Westerners, and HIV: AIDS and Cultures of Blame in Africa. Walnut Creek, Calif.: Left Coast Press, 2006. Pp. ix + 247.
Alexander Rodlach provides a substantive analysis of processes of meaning-making surrounding the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Zimbabwe. Focusing on "sorcery" beliefs and theories of "conspiracy," his book queries "how these two types of belief became attached to the disease, attributing the epidemic with meaning and behavior" (p. 4). It consistently and effectively argues that in present-day Zimbabwe conspiracy theories and sorcery beliefs operate in tandem to offer everyday understandings of the medical causalities of the epidemic and ...