Overview

This timely book explores the troubled intertwining of religion, medicine, empire, and race relations in the early nineteenth century. John Rankin analyzes the British use of medicine in West Africa as a tool to usher in a “softer” form of imperialism, considers how British colonial officials, missionaries, and doctors regarded Africans, and explores the impact of race classification on colonial constructs. Rankin goes beyond contemporary medical theory, examining the practice of medicine in colonial Africa as Britons dealt with the challenges of providing health care to their civilian employees, African soldiers, and the increasing numbers of freed slaves in the general population, even while the imperialists themselves were threatened by a lack of British doctors and western medicines.

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9780826220547

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Reviews

A fascinating study of the intersection of disease, medicine, and ideas about race and difference in British West Africa in the first half of the 19th century. It will be read with interest by historians of Africa, the Atlantic World, empire, and disease & medicine. Charles Ambler, Professor of History, University of Texas at El Paso Effectively organized and presented, Healing the African Body is very highly recommended for academic library collections and the personal reading lists of non-specialist general readers with an interest in colonial era African history. Micahael J. Carson, Midwest Book Review

Provides an in-depth examination of a somewhat novel time and place. --Choice Effectively organized and presented, Healing the African Body is very highly recommended for academic library collections and the personal reading lists of non-specialist general readers with an interest in colonial era African history. --Midwest Book Review A fascinating study of the intersection of disease, medicine, and ideas about race and difference in British West Africa in the first half of the 19th century. It will be read with interest by historians of Africa, the Atlantic World, empire, and disease & medicine. --Charles Ambler, Professor of History, University of Texas at El Paso A fascinating study of the intersection of disease, medicine, and ideas about race and difference in British West Africa in the first half of the 19th century. It will be read with interest by historians of Africa, the Atlantic World, empire, and disease & medicine. Charles Ambler, Professor of History, University of Texas at El Paso Effectively organized and presented, Healing the African Body is very highly recommended for academic library collections and the personal reading lists of non-specialist general readers with an interest in colonial era African history. Micahael J. Carson, Midwest Book Review A fascinating study of the intersection of disease, medicine, and ideas about race and difference in British West Africa in the first half of the 19th century. It will be read with interest by historians of Africa, the Atlantic World, empire, and disease & medicine. --Charles Ambler, Professor of History, University of Texas at El Paso

Effectively organized and presented, Healing the African Body is very highly recommended for academic library collections and the personal reading lists of non-specialist general readers with an interest in colonial era African history. --Midwest Book Review

A fascinating study of the intersection of disease, medicine, and ideas about race and difference in British West Africa in the first half of the 19th century. It will be read with interest by historians of Africa, the Atlantic World, empire, and disease & medicine. --Charles Ambler, Professor of History, University of Texas at El Paso

Author Information

John Rankin is an assistant professor in the department of history at East Tennessee State University located in Johnson City, Tennessee, USA. His research interests lie in the overlapping themes of imperialism, transnational and global studies, issues of race and racism, and the social history of medicine.

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