| Based on field research in a single community, this dissertation embeds competing healing practices in their shifting religious and ideological contexts. In the first part, the study connects the struggle over control of the local dispensary with the political designs of village leaders and the popular meanings of biomedicine. The second part examines the moral dimensions of therapeutic pluralism. It portrays the overlapping discourses of three Haitian religions: formal Catholicism, Protestant sects, and the worship of domestic spirits (Vodoun). By positioning themselves within this plural religious system, healers authorize their own therapeutic knowledge and challenge the moral legitimacy of other options. Extended case-studies demonstrate that people draw upon multiple models to interpret affliction, and that each model poses different threats to the personal virtue of the sufferer. In negotiating among competing therapies, people seek both to cure the illness and ensure their moral worth. |
