ResumoAtravés de uma descrição detalhada das consultas médicas de mães Cabo-Verdianas, estudantes em Portugal, observadas ao longo de dois anos de trabalho de campo, este artigo pretende elucidar as relações de poder inerentes na institucionalização da biomedicina em que as diferenças culturais são ignoradas, mal-entendidas e criticadas, oferecendo uma análise crítica sobre o princípio de tratamento igual para todos. A observação das consultas médi-cas faz parte de uma abordagem metodológica mais abrangente de acompanhar mães nas suas consultas com assistentes sociais e oficiais da imigração e de realizar entrevistas semi-estruturadas com as mulheres sobre as suas experiências de maternidade. A etnografia revela não só as limitações de uma políti-ca de um universalismo cego que nega as diferenças em nome do humanismo e dos direitos universais como revela a necessidade de se fazer uma distinção conceptual entre "literacia no domínio da saúde" (LDS) e "literacia dos sistemas de saúde" (LSS). Ao demonstrar como a biomedicina não pode ser separada do contexto cultural no qual é praticada, o artigo argumenta que o objectivo de promover a LSS de imigrantes, conhecedores de outras abordagens e sistemas de saúde, devia ser considerado como uma estratégia mais ampla de promoção de competência intercultural que visa ajudar tanto os médicos como os pacientes. Evitar utilizar o termo LDS que implicitamente rotula imigrantes como "analfabetos", é uma forma de valorizar as suas culturas, práticas e interesses alternativas em matéria de saúde e de ajudar a dissolver a hierarquia dos saberes entre médicos e pacientes imigrantes. AbstractThrough detailed ethnographic descriptions of Cape Verdean student migrant mothers' encounters with the Portuguese health system, based on two years of fieldwork, the aim of the paper is to elucidate the power relations inherent in institutionalised medical encounters through which cultural differences are ignored, misconstrued and criticised in order to provide a critical reflection upon the principle of equal, universal treatment for all. The observation of medical encounters constitutes part of a broader methodological approach of accompanying the mothers to appointments with doctors, social workers and immigration officials, as well as conducting semi-structured interviews with the women upon their experiences of motherhood. The ethnography not only highlights the shortcomings of a policy of blind universalism which denies difference in the name of humanism and human rights but also reveals the need to make a conceptual distinction between "health literacy" and "health systems literacy". By demonstrating how biomedical knowledge cannot be separated from the cultural context within which it is practised, the paper argues that promoting the systems literacy of immigrants who are literate in alternative health approaches and systems should be regarded as part of a wider strategy to increase the intercultural competency of doctors and patients alike. Refraining from using the term "health liter...

No abstract

No abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this article is to examine encounters between Cape Verdean student mothers and Portuguese professionals in the social care sector, and look at what kinds of care relations were established and whether culture is a significant factor.Design/methodology/approachThe approach was participant observation in appointments, the dynamics of which were examined within a broader analysis of the workings of “authoritative knowledge” and how this interlocks with “cultural authority”.FindingsThe workings of “authoritative knowledge” obscured the influences of the professionals' own culture upon the care provided. The women were thus treated as “problems” in need of “solutions”, in order to conform to normative models of responsible citizens and mothers. By treating issues of birth control and good parenting in isolation from the women's cultural contexts, professionals' attempts to regulate and correct women's behaviour was potentially alienating.Research limitations/implicationsFuture research should focus in more detail on how strategies that aim to raise awareness of and accommodate cultural differences can be institutionalized in such a way that they are not dismissed as yet another demand upon overburdened professionals. One of the main limitations of the research was that health professionals were not interviewed.Originality/valueThe article provides original ethnographic data which help to further the debate on intercultural competency for care providers.

Cape Verde's history of colonial neglect, drought, famine and forced migration, coupled with its arid climate, poor resource base, and dependence upon foreign aid has turned migration into a structural survival strategy. Cape Verdean identity is thus marked by a collective looking forward towards other geographical locations where relatives and friends have made a new home and a collective looking backwardsto relatives and friends left behind in what becomes an imaginary and desired homeland. Wherever Cape Verdeans are located, their identity claims are conditioned by this double-sided gaze: looking outwards towards the influences of other locations and of the external categorizations Cape Verdeans are subjected to by others and looking inwards towards a more intimate "homing" space of memory, meaning and self-ascription. The paper examines these processes through a discussion of the challenges posed to young Cape Verdeans pursuing education in northern Portugal and examines how identity claims are constructed through nation, citizenship and personhood elucidating the ways in which these may become intertwined in processes of diasporization and of creolization. Cape Verde offers a paradigmatic case for distinguishing between creolization and creoleness since an analytical usage of the concept 'creole' may be used to deconstruct normative interpretations of the term Creole in social and political practice.