Data Performativity, Performing Health Work: Malaria and Labor in Senegal. Issue 5 (4th July 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Tichenor, Marlee
• Is Part Of: Medical anthropology. Volume 36:Issue 5(2017)
• Page Start: 436
• Page End: 448
• Publication Date: 2017-07-04
• Subjects: Senegal -- data -- global health -- labor -- malaria -- performativity; Medical anthropology -- Periodicals; 362.1
• DOI: 10.1080/01459740.2017.1316722
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0145-9740

Abstract

ABSTRACT: In this article, I investigate the ramifications of health data production in the health fight against malaria in and around Dakar, Senegal. Malaria health development funding at the community level is contingent on performativity; the Global Fund's "performance-based funding, " for example, requires that local actors produce certain forms of evidence and that intermediaries synthesize this evidence into citable data. Analyzing the practices of diagnosis and approximation in health clinics and in global malaria documents, I argue that data production in Senegal is conditioned by and reifies preconceived notions of malaria as a problem addressable by the enumeration of technological fixes.