Conflicting moralities in Northwestern Cameroon. A different history of AIDS in Africa

Far from being dismissed as denialism, the interpretations of AIDS that have emerged across various African contexts, when historically contextu- alized, assert an alternative cultural construction of the epidemic. These in- terpretations situate the disease within the power dynamics that define the social order – both locally and globally, in the present as well as the past –. Drawing on the case of the Nso’ kingdom in North-West Cameroon – where witchcraft has served as the principal discursive framework for inter- preting the epidemic and its causes – this paper argues that local interpreta- tions cannot be reduced to a mistaken understanding of reality in need of correction. On the contrary, a careful analysis reveals that they offer valuable insights into the social dynamics that shaped the transmission of infection along specific social trajectories, exposing some – rather than others – to risk and illness. The critical value of the humanities and social sciences may lie precisely in their ability to reassemble reality through the historical analysis of the practices that culturally shape it.