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Robert Thornton
Professor Robert Thornton (BA Stanford, MA & PhD Chicago) is a medical anthropologist and ethnographer at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. His current research concentrates on African indigenous knowledge (‘traditional healing’, bungoma) in responses to HIV and other medical and health issues, using ethnographic and medical anthropological approaches. His recent book on HIV/AIDS, ‘Unimagined Community: Sex, networks and AIDS in Uganda and South Africa’ (University of California Press 2008) explores comparatively the role of sexual networks and local, cultural knowledge in the variations in HIV prevalence that both countries have experienced. He is currently completing a book ‘Metals, Magic and Muti’ (Jacana) about southern African indigenous medical and magical knowledge, especially its material culture, in the context of southern African landscapes and ecologies. He has published in several different fields including history, intellectual history, East African ethnography, and theory in anthropology. He has been employed at University of Chicago, the University of Cape Town, Rutgers University, The Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton), and has been visiting lecturer at many American, European, and African universities. He has worked at the University of the Witwatersrand since 1992.

created/edited 20 September 2013