ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts covered in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides the intertwinements between religion and biomedicine in Africa in the context of AIDS treatment. It explores biomedical treatment and its consequences as a horizon through which to address sociological and theoretical concerns regarding agency, subjectivity and authority. In the complex relationships between religious ideologies, practices and organizations on the one hand, and biomedical treatment for AIDS on the other, new dynamics are evolving in fields of healing. The book focuses on organizational dynamics: the ways in which antiretroviral treatment (ART) rollout provide the context for religious organizations to re-imagine and reconfigure their place in structures of welfare, development and networks of medical humanitarianism. It deals with how religious communities and practices shape therapeutic ideas and hopes. On the one hand, such processes entail the redrawing of boundaries between and shaping of distinct therapeutic domains: biomedicine, the Holy Spirit and traditional healing.
