Aprendendo o uso das ervas: a trajetória de terapeutas populares

• Autor(a) principal: Oliveira, Thaís Fonseca Veloso de
• Data de Publicação: 2012
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações da UERJ
• Texto Completo: http://www.bdtd.uerj.br/handle/1/4089
• topic: Public health; Traditional medicine; Medicinal plants; Saúde coletiva; Medicina tradicional; Plantas medicinais; CNPQ::CIENCIAS DA SAUDE::SAUDE COLETIVA

The use of herbs and plants for therapeutic purposes is quite old and registered in various societies. This research seeks to investigate how the process of construction and reproduction of knowledge in folk medicine (particularly the use of herbs and medicinal plants) through the life story of popular therapists - people who have become references in their communities for acquiring, practicing and transmitting this knowledge. It aims to identify and understand the process of knowledge construction about medicinal plants by popular therapists in the city of Rio de Janeiro; to understand the forms of reproduction of this knowledge; and to understand the context of the relationship between these practitioners and the scientific knowledge. The oral history, with an emphasis on life history, was used as a methodological approach. Seven popular therapists were interviewed in different districts of the city. It was observed that the knowledge about the medicinal herbs is not restricted to a small group and limited to a form of oral transmission. Knowledge has been reproduced, but also has been modified, mingling with other forms of knowledge and punctuated by several information sources ranging from oral transmission to information available in the media. The main form of knowledge reproduction seems to be the perpetuation of a business, which evokes the traditional speech, the nature of herbs and their beneficial properties and is supported by an information network that uses various means of communication and a production and trade network that ensures economic sustenance for the popular therapists. The transformation of the practice of using herbs in cultural heritage or family business ensures the perpetuation of knowledge, and it also ensures a different space within the practices of health care. The relationship of therapists with official medicine is not a tensioned one, although there are criticisms, but one with the interposal of the therapeutic systems.