The Sopono cult and smallpox vaccinations in Lagos
OA Version
Citation
Abstract
INTRODUCTION:
This paper examines the question of how African societies view
conditions which Western society calls "disease," and how Africans
respond to Western-oriented medical efforts to deal with "disease."
This paper is based on data obtained before and during an international
smallpox vaccination campaign in West Africa, among husbands
and senior wives in a random sample of households •. All of the data
were obtained in metropolitan Lagos, and the analysis focuses on
members of the large Yoruba tribe who comprised 81 percent of the
sample.
It is recognized that an urban sample cannot be considered
characteristic of either African or Yoruba society. At the same time,
Lagos is regarded as peculiarly intensive in blend of African and
Western influences (see especially Mabogunje, 1968), and the analysis
also focuses on this aspect and derives special interest because of
this concentration of social forces in one compact geographical area.
Description
African Studies Center Working Paper No. 11
License
Copyright © 1979, by the author.