Conceptualization and practices in digital health voices from Africa

This paper presents voices from Africa on digital health in Africa. These voices were gleaned during interviews and an online, focus group session in May 2020, during which 30 experts across Africa, among others from the South, were asked about their experiences and observations on the conceptualization of, and practices in, digital health in their respective communities and countries. Extensive input was provided, both orally and textually. The quotes gathered and presented in this paper indicate that there is a distinct need for the respectful co-development of digital health interventions in Africa. In addition, the quotes show how a one-size-fits-all solution approach does not exist, it is not a solution to Africa. Further, the community-focus, fit, and fragmentation of existing activities digital health interventions is questioned. The narratives provide a rich resource indicating capable and local agency and the need to address power-differences in international health development

This is who we are and why!: Ethnography of weddings in Ibadan,Nigeria

Background: Wedding ceremonies celebrate marital unions of two individuals/families in accordance with socially sanctioned arrangements. Among the Yoruba of south-western Nigeria, weddings of various forms exist. Elaborate and relatively grand weddings are common among the Yoruba people but studies are insufficient on these weddings. More attention is thus needed to understand the trajectories and ramifications of these weddings especially within the socio-economic conditions and rapidly changing social environments that have implications for population and development. This article is therefore an attempt to describe contemporary marriage ceremonies among the Yoruba in Ibadan, Southwestern Nigeria and the meanings associated with the ceremonies. The article is a detailed ethnographic narrative of Yoruba marriage processes. Data Sources and Method: Primary and secondary data were gathered. For the primary data, qualitative research method was used. Data collection methods were participant observations (10 different wedding venues) and 15 in-depth interviews. Interpretive research approach through interviews, observations and pictures were used because of their capacities to extract reliable contextual meanings and implicative elements of social realities. Secondary data were gathered from journal articles, books, newspaper clippings and reliable internet sources. Data analysis was done through content analysis of texts and pictures. Results: Findings reveal very original and dynamically creative ways of celebrating weddings and significance of such weddings among the Yoruba people with implications for better understanding of Africa's socio-economic and cultural systems, population and development. Conclusion: Weddings are significant social realities in context. While they preceed family formation and traditionally crucial, they are both physical and cultural just as they are systematically symbolic and demonstrative of familial and sociocultural statuses and class in Africa. Weddings in the context are indication and legitimation of identity and existencies and these have strategic implications for social change, cultural systems and population

Restauration de l'esthétique au niveau des dents antérieures: expérimentation clinique du set de dentisterie esthétique Heliocolor

Dans la société traditionnelle ivoirienne et africaine en général, la cavite buccale et les dents en particulier sont l'objet des tabous réligieux, et figurent en bonne partie les canons de beauté. Le changement du mode de vie suscite par le modernisme n'a en rien altere l'interet esthetique porte aux dents anterieures, lequel figure parmi les plus fréquents de consultation. Cette etude tente de repondre à cette attente en se penchant sur la restauration des dents présentant des anomalies et des teintes frequentes dans nos regions

Conception et representation de la maladie en Afrique Noire traditionnelle: le cas des GEN-MINA du Togo

La conception de la maladie dans les societes traditionnelles africaines et en particulier dans l'aire culturelle ADJA-EWE (dont font partie les GEN-MINA) qui nous interesse ici; repose essentiellement sur deux idees principales. Tout d'abord; la perception de la maladie comme phenomene congenital a l'homme; ensuite comme element de perturbation psycho-physiologique; mais aussi sociale; emanant d'agents exogenes telles que les divinites et les personnes malintentionnees: sorciers; magiciens. Aussi; la prise en compte de ces forces supra ou extranaturelles dans l'etude de la maladie et ses diverses manifestations; permet-elle une vision toute particuliere du phenomene; en dehors d'un certain champ d'application qui se voudrait exclusivement rationnel