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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The historiography of HIV and AIDS in Uganda |
Author: | Kuhanen, Jan |
Year: | 2008 |
Periodical: | History in Africa (ISSN 1558-2744) |
Volume: | 35 |
Pages: | 301-325 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Uganda |
Subjects: | AIDS historiography medical history |
External link: | http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/history_in_africa/v035/35.kuhanen.pdf |
Abstract: | This paper approaches the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Uganda through its present historiography, although in a way it is too early to speak about a historiography of HIV/AIDS. It maps some of the approaches taken by historians and historically-minded researchers in other disciplines and identifies some points of controversy, arguing that the history of HIV and AIDS is a contested issue, and that historical research is needed to add consistency to the interest-laden debate over HIV/AIDS. There is a danger that in the absence of adequate sources and consolidated paradigms and concepts, history will go wrong on AIDS, and policies based on that history will in the worst case cost human lives. Historians should focus on the socioeconomic, political and cultural forces which direct human actions and shape their responses to misfortunes such as AIDS. The paper concludes that important contributions to the history of AIDS have been made by authors with various kinds of academic backgrounds and experience, but as long as there is no comprehensive professional historical analysis of the various aspects of HIV/AIDS in Uganda, constructions and interpetations based on fragmentary evidence and variable motives will continue to appear. Ref. [ASC Leiden abstract] |