Far from being the province of magic, witchcraft, and sorcery, indigenous understanding of contagious disease in Africa and elsewhere in the developing world very often parallels western concepts of germ theory, according to the author. Labeling this 'indigenous contagion theory (ICT),' Green synthesizes the voluminous ethnographic work on tropical diseases and remedies_as well as 20 years of his own studies and interventions on sexually transmitted diseases, AIDS, and traditional healers in southern Africa_to demonstrate how indigenous peoples generally conceive of contagious diseases as having naturalistic causes. His groundbreaking work suggests how western medical practitioners can incorporate ICT to better help native peoples control contagious diseases.

By Edward C. Green

chapter 1 W. Penn Handwerker, Foreword
chapter 2 Acknowledgments
chapter 3 Introduction
chapter 4 1: African Health Beliefs
chapter 5 2: Pollution and Other Contagion Beliefs Among Bantu Speakers
chapter 6 3: Resistance to Illness and the Internal Snake Concept
chapter 7 4: Child Diarrhea
chapter 8 5: Sexually Transmitted Diseases and AIDS
chapter 9 6: Malaria, Tuberculosis, and Other Infectious Diseases
chapter 10 7: Indigenous Contagion Theory in Broader Perspective
chapter 11 8: Theoretical Implications
chapter 12 References
chapter 13 Index
chapter 14 About the Author