AIDS, sex and condoms: African healers and the reinvention of tradition in Zaire.

Condoms offer considerable protection against sexual transmission of AIDS. Yet many Africans who are at risk of infection reject condoms as "unnatural." Data from Zaire have been used to examine this culturally constructed category in relation to sexuality, procreation, gender roles, class formation and international health and development policy. Much more than a simple transfer of biomedical technology is involved. Condom use with regular partners raises issues of cultural politics at many levels. "Traditional" African healers represent important social networks with considerable authority in poor urban communities. They are able to reinterpret cultural categories and endow behavior with new meanings. Action-research in Kinshasa was used to explore roles that healers might play in promoting change to safer sex practices.