Sickness and healing : a case study on the dialectic of culture and personality

Abstract

Sickness and healing expenence is universal, but the context in which both are

perceived and dealt with is particular. Culture and the individual constitute the universal context. The social structures, values, beliefs, the symbol system of a culture and the tendency of the individual to act upon his existence within cultural parameters, inform the particular context. The relationship that exists between culture and the individual is best described as dialectic. The concept of dialect is the theoretical tool to analytically show how this relationship works out in real life. At the base of this relationship operates conflict. Sickness, or permanent ill health since early childhood as shown in an in-depth case study, triggers conflict on at least two levels: the personal-psychological and the socio­ cultural level. To effectively deal with sickness and the inner conflicts caused by it, is to channel the motivation to resolve them by way of employing a symbolic idiom, a cultural symbol that attains personal meaning. G. Chewe P. of Bemba ethnicity, the main actor of this thesis, demonstrates how his life experience of sickness made various

symbols become operational, how he filled them with personal meaning, and that there was no hiatus between the public and private domain. Healing requires more than medical aid. Cultural symbols that become

personal symbols are often tied into religious experience of some kind. Individuals who successfully employ personal symbols eventually achieve healing because the symbolic

idiom helps them to resolve intrapsychic conflict.

Missiology cannot escape from two realities: culture and the individual. If anything, missiology must be interested in culture and the individual. Missiology, in the role of aide-de-camps of the Christian Mission, shows the history of how individuals connect to God, and how God transforms them in their cultural environment. To be able to achieve both goals, the issues of context and conflict must be addressed. This thesis seeks to account for the dialectic between culture and the individual, how context and conflict shaped the person and the Christian G. Chewe P. of Bemba ethnicity, and how he acted upon this context to resolve his travail.