Van Der Geest

Biographic Data

ID2018
NAMEVan Der Geest
FAMILY NAMEVan Der Geest
SIGNATUREVAN DER GEEST
AFFILIATIONSUniversity of Amsterdam
ORCID0000-0002-9943-6415
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS133
TOTAL CITATIONS1126
AUTHOR COUNT133
EDITOR COUNT0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1976
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2026
H-INDEX17

  • ‘“Good morning, good morning” does not kill the old lady.’The charm and complexity of greeting in Kwahu, Ghana

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeestARTICLECommunication Cultures in Africa2026

    An anthropologist looks back on his personal experiences of greeting as a form of communication in a rural town in Ghana. The fieldwork observations took place over a long period, from 1969 until 2015. Greetings are daily performances of cultural competence, hierarchy and relationship. They are also signals of respect, politeness and reciprocity, and provide opportunities for playfulness as well as social and communal engagement and relationships…

  • Embracing Uncertainty

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeestCHAPTERHope and Uncertainty in Health…2024

  • Care as tyranny

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Coleta PlatenkampARTICLEAnthropology & Humanism2024Cited by: 4References: 16

    This article focuses on undesired care transgressions that violate the intimacy, autonomy, and humanity of patients, pregnant women, and older people. Undesired care that hurts patients is referred to as “violence,” “abuse,” and “dehumanization.” This can take different forms: physical, verbal, and emotional, as well as deliberate negligence. We have dubbed this type of transgressive care “tyranny.” The data for this article are derived from a wi…

  • Anthropology Anonymous? Some Comments to Julia Vorhölter

    Open AccessVan Der GeestARTICLEEthnoscripts2021

    This brief comment discusses the methodological and ethical implications and complications of anonymising ethnographic research. Special attention is given to the possibility of use of pseudonyms and its hazards and to the moral imperative of trust

  • Divergent Views and Experiences Regarding ‘Completed Life’ and Euthanasia in the Netherlands

    Open AccessPriya Satalkar, Van Der GeestARTICLEOMEGA - Journal of Death and Dying2021

    A small proportion of older people in the Netherlands want to end their lives because they feel their lives to be 'completed' and no longer worth living. Currently, there is heated debate over whether or not these people should have the right to euthanasia. Drawing on previous research, we conduct a heuristic analysis of views and experiences of three different 'parties' involved in this debate, namely, the older people, their relatives and frien…

  • The Charm of Medicines

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der Geest et al.ARTICLESocio-anthropologie2021

    Medicines are absolutely central to health care in the views of both patients and practitioners. This fact, which has long been taken for granted in Western cultures, is being brought urgently to our attention as manufactured pharmaceuticals become widely available in developing countries. Reports on the intense interest in drugs have corne in from ail parts of the world. Anthropologists, who long neglected the study of medicines in favor of more…

  • Spirit Children

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeestARTICLEMedicine Anthropology Theory2021

  • Obituary

    Open AccessFilip De Boeck, Van Der Geest et al.ARTICLEMedicine Anthropology Theory2021

    Obituary for René Devisch (1944-2020

  • Comment mourir si la mort est planifiée

    Van Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der Geest et al.ARTICLEAnthropologie et Sociétés2021References: 5

    Cet essai examine deux changements importants que subissent le mourir et la mort dans le monde pluriforme et sécularisé d'aujourd'hui. Le premier changement met en scène l'autonomie, les souhaits d'autonomie nourris pendant la vie s'étendant désormais au moment et à la manière de mourir. L'euthanasie permet à une personne d'éviter la condition douloureuse et difficile qui précède la fin de vie. Un second changement majeur est que ceux qui meurent…

  • Thinking About 'Completed Life' Euthanasia in the Netherlands from the Generative Perspective

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Priya SatalkarARTICLEAnthropology & Aging2021

    In this reflective essay, we explore the concept of generativity and propose it as a more positive interpretation of the experience of 'completed life' and its bearing on the wish to die. In 2010, more than 100,000 people in the Netherlands signed a petition requesting an extension of the existing euthanasia legislation. They asked the government to grant euthanasia to older persons who feel tired of life and who regard their lives as complete, i…

  • Escaping the ‘unprepared generation’ trap

    Priya Satalkar, Van Der Geest et al.ARTICLEMortality2020

    This article analyses discussions in the Netherlands about extending the current euthanasia legislation to include older people who are tired of living and want to end life without being sick or suffering unbearable pain. We look at these discussion from a generational perspective: the present generation of older people has learned from the experiences of the previous generation that life may last longer than they want and it might be challenging…

  • Brokers on the Ward

    Open AccessShahaduz Zaman, Van Der GeestARTICLEAsian journal of social science2020Cited by: 2References: 20

    This paper is based on an ethnographic study conducted in a public hospital in Bangladesh. The study shows how the social dynamics necessary to deal with the structural realities of the hospital give this cosmopolitan institution a local character. In this paper, we describe this local character by focusing on the lower-level hospital staff, such as ward boys, cleaners, and gatemen. Social inequality and exclusion are rampant in Bangladeshi publi…

  • Look under the sheets!’ Fighting with the senses in relation to defecation and bodily care in hospitals and care institutions

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Shahaduz ZamanARTICLEMedical Humanities2020Cited by: 2References: 6

    This essay focuses on sensory aspects of care in situations surrounding defecation in hospitals and other care institutions. Sensory activity does not merely encompass pleasant experiences that enhance healing and well-being. Anthropologists-and other disciplines as well-have paid little attention to unpleasant and disgusting experiences that our senses meet and that may rather increase pain and suffering in the context of care. Our essay therefo…

  • An anthropology of lying

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeestARTICLEMedicine Anthropology Theory2020

  • Witchcraft and a life in the new South Africa

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeestARTICLEMedicine Anthropology Theory2020

  • Not-knowing and the proliferation of assumptions

    Open AccessSahienshadebie Ramda, Sahienshadebie Ramdas et al.ARTICLEAnthropology and Medicine2020Cited by: 1References: 21

    Why do patients and others confronted with cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) - a parasitic skin disease - in the hinterland of Suriname, South America, provide a dazzling variety of aetiological explanations for one single illness? And how do these explanations reflect local knowledge of and interest in the origin of illness? In this article, we explore these questions using the concept of 'not-knowing', as introduced by Murray Last in 1981. One of La…

  • Autonomy and dying

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Priya SatalkarARTICLEDeath Studies2019Cited by: 3References: 2

    Euthanasia in the Netherlands is based on the notion that the person seeking assistance to die is able to make an autonomous decision. The objective of this study is to explore this notion, in particular, in the case of "tiredness of life." The article is mainly based on two qualitative researches and two selected case histories that provide an in-depth insight into the complex process of (not) reaching a clear decision. We found three obstacles …

  • Deanna Trakas

    Open AccessVan Der Geest, Sjaak Van Der GeeARTICLEAnthropology News2019

    Trakas introduced the eld of medical anthropology to Greece.She carefully oversaw its establishment and dissemination through her own research and that of the doctoral candidates she supervised.Among the topics about which she was the most outspoken was the neglected voice of children in our research.Her publications on children increasingly focused on children's emic perspectives-a drastic move away from the "adultist"

  • Avoided Family Care, Diverted Intimacy

    Van Der Geest, Svan der Geest van der Geest et al.ARTICLEAfrica Today2019Cited by: 2

    This article aims at nuancing the discussion of processes of globalization and change through ethnographic research on caregiving in Ghana. It points at a cautious but remarkable shift from traditional family care to care outside the family setting and raises the question how this shift is linked to external and internal processes of change. The presentation of an extended case of avoiding family care by people living with HIV/AIDS serves to sugg…

  • Introduction to Special Issue on Intimacy, Morality, and Precarity

    U M Read, Read et al.ARTICLEAfrica Today2019Cited by: 2References: 19

    With the rise of noncommunicable diseases such as diabetes and cancer, as well as increased longevity, the role of the family in care has increasing importance in health policy and interventions globally. In low-income settings in sub-Saharan Africa, where health and welfare systems are under-resourced, task shifting to community health workers, volunteers, and family members is sometimes proposed to fill the gaps; however migration, urbanization…

  • Generations in Africa. Connections and Conflicts

    Erdmute Alber, Van Der Geest et al.

    In this book, sixteen studies examine relations between generations of kin and between historical and political generations. The topics range from grandmother's cooking, migrant remittances, youth unemployment, teenage pregnancy, Valentine's Day, and hip hop music, to respect, religious virtue, gerontocracy, memory, wisdom, complaint, and the meaning of tradition.

  • Anthropology and the

    Van Der Geest, A Petryna et al.

  • Embracing Uncertainty

    Van Der Geest

    Uncertainty has been an all-pervasive part of my biography.Needless to explain that being brought up in a devout Christian tradition that teaches absolute truth (in spite of a famous biblical passage in which the protagonist rhetorically asks, "What is truth?"),one is constantly in doubt about these unproven truths.Interestingly, that very same epistemological not-knowing has been made the cornerstone of believing.Faith based on knowledge would n…

  • The Intertwining of Formal and Informal Medicine Distribution in South Cameroon

    Van Der Geest

    Sjaak van der Geest, The Intertwining of Formal and Informal Medicine Distribution in South Cameroon, Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue Canadienne des Études Africaines, Vol. 19, No. 3 (1985), pp. 569-587

  • Critical Terms for the Study of Africa

    Van Der GeestCited by: 1

    Critical terms for the study of Africa is a collection of 25 articles that aims, as the editors state in their introduction, ‘to sharpen, rethink, modulate, and sometimes jettison the conceptual fr