Tag: After-Life

A year on, Guineans finally lay Ebola souls to rest

GUECKEDOU, 28 April 2015 (IRIN) – Forty-six-year-old Maurice Ouendeno stares silently at the arm of his blue plastic lawn chair. He waits a few minutes before beginning his story. “They said we did not have the right to bury him,” he says, finally looking up. Sadness, mixed with a bit of anger, flashes briefly across his face. “We understood why, but it was painful. It was so painful not to be able to give him the send-off he deserved.” His father, Tamba Lamine Ouendeno, died Continue reading →

The significance of death, funerals and the after-life in Ebola-hit Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia: Anthropological insights into infection and social resistance

The aim of this briefing paper is to consider the various ways in which widely reported fear and resistance to the Ebola response can be understood, and what each way of understanding offers to those battling with the current epidemic. As far as this paper is concerned, there is no single ‘right way’ to comprehend resistance to educators, medics and burial teams, as this is a very complex social phenomenon. The aim instead is to outline the variety of ways in which resistance can be Continue reading →