The Anatomy of Power : European Constructions of the African Body

'It is difficult to identify a single example of a colonial or post-colonial society in which the public health official, the primary health care nurse, the hospital doctor, the psychiatrist, and many other representatives of the socio-medical sciences are not present. It is equally impossible to identify any setting where the population has no knowledge of how to act and react in the ritual of the medical examination by doctor, inspection by the aid worker, interrogation by the anthropologist, or enumeration by the census officer,' writes Alex Butchart.

Using Foucault's thinking on the relationship between power and knowledge, the author of this extraordinary book analyzes the ways in which the body of 'The African' has itself been analyzed in western thought from the Renaissance to the present. The book not only provides a critical edge to debates around colonialism and African identity, it is also an invaluable new reservoir of source materials for scholars with a passion for knowing the body politic and its anatomy of power.

“An unabashed application of Foucauldian ideas to the understanding of the African body. Butchart demonstrates the validity of this thesis in different contextual settings.” —Choice

“An excellent contribution to crucial issues in the social sciences - subjectivity, power, knowledge, the production of truth, health and illness. Revolutionary in a particularly constructive sense.” —C.S. de Beer, Information Science, UNISA

“Offers a novel and radical perspective on the emergence of the African body that transcends other writing in the field. Extensive and comprehensive, it covers an enormous span of history and breadth of literature. Highly original.” —David Armstrong, Guys Hospital, London

“An invaluable contribution to interpretive science, and a literary achievement.” —Wilhelm Jordaan, University of Pretoria