Health and identity in Egypt : shifting frontiers / edited by Hania Sholkamy and Farha Ghannam.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Sholkamy, Hania.

Contributor:

Ghannam, Farha, 1963-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social medicine--Egypt.

Social medicine.

Health.

Beauty, Personal.

Egypt.

Physical Description:

ix, 129 pages ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Cairo ; New York : American University in Cairo Press, 2004.

Summary:

Four anthropologists argue the relevance of bodily experiences and conditions to the understanding of social processes in Egypt. Using recent ethnography that describes beliefs and practices concerning infertility, beauty, and physical and spiritual health, the authors engage with issues of identity in both urban and rural Egyptian settings. Each study attempts to transcend the notions of viewing health and ill-health as simple physical experiences and to draw out their social and political significance. Throughout the studies, Egyptians express their cultures, identity, and beliefs through their enactment of bodily conditions and their quests for therapies of all kinds. While the focus of this volume is on health and beauty, its contribution lies within the tradition of modern social analysis and critique, offering fresh insights to the study of identity that takes us beyond the divide between being and becoming. Book jacket.

Contents:

The Reproductive Health Working Group ix

A Discourse of Resistance: Spirit Possession among Women in Low-income Cairo / Heba El-Kholy 21

Quest for Beauty: Globalization, Identity, and the Production of Gendered Bodies in Low-income Cairo / Farha Ghannam 43

Fi nas wi fi nas: Class Culture and Illness Practice in Egypt / Montasser M. Kamal 65

Mushahra: The Justice and Injustice of Infertility / Hania Sholkamy 91

Conclusion: The Medical Cultures of Egypt / Hania Sholkamy 111.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

9774248333

OCLC:

56083818