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Childhood sexual abuse among Kanak women in New Caledonia : lowering the tolerated-violence threshold This article focuses on childhood sexual abuse among Kanak women in New Caledonia (Pacific Region). Data were collected by interviews with women aged 18 to 54. One out of eight Kanak women reported having been sexually abused before age 15. In the majority of cases the abuse was committed by a male family member. Younger women were more likely to report childhood sexual abuse than older ones. They were also more likely to disclose the abuse. These results lead to examine the issues raised by the measurement of childhood sexual abuse in an indigenous community where social change regarding family and gendered relations is linked to lesser tolerance to gender-related violence.

The role of experience in the construction of lay persons' knowledge of diabetes among diabetic patients in Bamako (Mali) This article studies the modalities of the construction of patients' knowledge concerning diabetes. The analysis is based on interviews conducted with men and women living in Bamako, Mali, who resort to biomedicine. The study shows that the production of lay persons' knowledge is based in part on policies for care conceived on international and national levels, some elements of which shape the quest for knowledge as well as modalities of its production. However, it is more on the microlocal level that the construction of knowledge takes shape. This level of analysis brings to light the diversity of sources of knowledge mobilized by those who are ill. Among the latter, experience occupies an important but ambivalent place. The link between experience and knowledge is in part formed on the basis of the spatial configuration of the health centres frequented and, according to the patients, hinges on the notions of legitimacy and effectiveness, revealing tensions between the knowledge transmitted by professionals and the knowledge issuing from experience.

Broker of the virtual : the controversial access to on-line medical information in Mali Telemedicine is at the core of international discourses related to health in developing countries. However, there are few evidence of Internet access by health staff in these countries and knowledge on its social uses is scarce. Based on the results of a qualitative research we conducted in 2007, this paper describes the social uses of telemedicine in Mali. It argues that the hierarchy within the health staff structures the social uses of Internet. Challenging the ideal of transparency of Internet, the paper shows the emergence of a new actor – the “ broker of the virtual”– mediating the relation between Internet and health professionals. Hence, the power dimension – inscribed in the social relations within the health staff– is a key element for the understanding of the actual uses of telemedicine.