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Appel à contribution - The History of Health Care in Africa : Actors, Experiences, and Perspectives in the 20th CenturyConference at the University of Basel, 12 to 14 September 2011Health in Sub-Saharan Africa has always  been experienced, debated and pursued in a specific historical context.  At the same time the history of health and health care in a specific  local setting cannot be separated from processes on a larger scale.  Neither diseases nor ideas and practices about health, healing and care  stopped at colonial or national borders. Patients, medical practitioners  and medicines moved ? whether connected to illness or not. A whole  array of inter- and transnational organisations and networks were  involved in the development, implementation and negotiation of health  strategies in African countries.This conference looks beyond the borders  of colonial empires and national states by bringing together researchers  with different temporal and spatial perspectives on the history of  health, health care and medical research in Sub-Saharan Africa. While  historical studies will lie at the core, the conference also includes  other disciplines, such as social anthropology, sociology, political  science, epidemiology, theology or international health.The conference concludes a three-year  research project on the ?History of Health Systems in Africa: Swiss  Mission Hospitals and Rural Health Delivery in the 20th Century?. The  project, led by the Department of History in collaboration with the  Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute and the Institute of Social  Anthropology, conducts a comparative analysis of the histories of three  former Swiss mission hospitals in Ghana, South Africa and Tanzania. Its  aim is to draw conclusions on the development of local and national  health care systems and the role faith-based health providers have  played in Africa.The conference takes up this comparative  approach. How did services develop in different local contexts? What  were the characteristics of the particular colonial or national setting?  And what relationship existed between local practice, international  developments and transnational processes? The role of faith-based and  other private non-profit organisations and networks will form one focal  point of the conference. Another main focus will be that of changing  health care strategies and their implementation on the ground in the  postcolonial era.We invite scholars to discuss questions related to the four following panels:1. Health care institutions in colonial and postcolonial Africa: knowledge, practice, politics2. The spiritual and the secular in faith-based health care3. Medical cultures and the political economy of biomedicine4. Changing health care strategies and development discourses in AfricaInterested scholars are invited to submit  paper proposals for presentation in one of the panels. The deadline for  submission is 15 March 2011. Abstracts should not exceed 300 words.  Those who have submitted an abstract will be notified by 15 April 2011  whether their paper has been accepted or not.Please send your abstract (max. 300 words) by 15 March 2011 to: afrika-tagung@unibas.chFor further information please visit our website: zasb.unibas.ch/hhsa-conference.We would be very grateful if you would  make use of your particular information channels and distribute the CFP  among colleagues and scholars working in the same or similar field.ConvenorsMarcel Dreier, MA, Researcher / Doctoral StudentDr. Hines Mabika, Researcher / Postdoctoral FellowLukas Meier, MA, Researcher / Doctoral StudentPascal Schmid, MA, Researcher / Doctoral StudentSteering CommitteeProf. Dr. Patrick Harries, Project LeaderProf. Dr. Brigit Obrist, Project Co-LeaderProf. Dr. Marcel Tanner, Project Co-LeaderDr. Piet van Eeuwijk, Scientific Coordinator