Abstract
The impact of biomedicine and biomedical technologies on identity and sociality has long been the focus of medical anthropology. In this article we revisit these debates in a discussion of how unprecedented encounters with biomedicine during the West African Ebola outbreak have featured in Sierra Leoneans’ understandings of citizenship and belonging, using the case study of an Ebola vaccine trial taking place in Kambia District (EBOVAC Salone). Analysing our ethnographic material in conversation with a historical analysis of notions of belonging and citizenship, we show how participation in a vaccine trial in a moment of crisis allowed people to tell stories about themselves as political subjects and to situate themselves in a conversation about the nature of citizenship that both pre-dates and post-dates the epidemic.
Highlights
Over the last few decades, anthropological research has revealed the effects of biomedical technology on identity and sociality (Whyte and Gibbon 2009)
Individual and community encounters with science and biomedicine have led to articulations of citizenship based on new categories and identities formed through these engagements, suggesting claims to social and political inclusion in a range of domains that transcend national boundaries (Wehling 2010)
The Ebola epidemic of 2014–2016 was what Das (1995, 6) would call a ‘critical event’, as ‘new modes of action came into being which redefined traditional categories’
Summary
Over the last few decades, anthropological research has revealed the effects of biomedical technology on identity and sociality (Whyte and Gibbon 2009). Individual and community encounters with science and biomedicine have led to articulations of citizenship based on new categories and identities formed through these engagements, suggesting claims to social and political inclusion in a range of domains that transcend national boundaries (Wehling 2010). Such forms of citizenship give rise to a complexity of social identities and collective actions for knowledge, recognition, and claims to expertise (Heath, Rapp, and Taussig 2007). Whyte (2009, 11) writes that ‘The active biological citizen informs herself, and lives responsibly, adjusting diet and lifestyle so as to maximize health’. Petryna (2013) draws a strong link between biology and political claims in her research on the Chernobyl disaster, finding that citizens utilised technologies, knowledge of symptoms, and legal procedures to gain political recognition and access to welfare benefits
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