Western Biomedicine and Colonialism

This chapter attempts to analyze the encounter of the indigenous African communities in the Lake Victoria basin with Western biomedicine beginning late 1880s through 1950. It explores the role of Western biomedicine in inscribing the European project of colonial hegemony on the bodies of Abaluyia, Baganda, Banyankole, Banyoro, Batoro, Basoga, Bagisu, Joluo and Iteso communities of the Great Lakes region of East Africa. Seeking to illuminate how modern medical history evolved in the region, I interrogate how Africans responded to the introduction of Western biomedicine, science and technology amongst them. I argue that the European Christian missionaries and administrators used the new medical knowledge, science and technology to police and control African bodies and minds. ¹