Dissertation Research: Native Perceptions of Plant Efficacy Among Indigenous Cultures of Peru

这个奖颁给了加州大学伯克利分校，资助一位文化人类学家在秘鲁亚马逊雨林的论文研究。问题是要了解美洲原住民如何识别森林中的药用植物。学生将评估当地人对味道、气味或感觉（苦、甜、涩、芳香、刺痛等）的特定线索的感知，这些线索被认为表明了治疗效果。将进行一项“味觉和嗅觉”实验，要求印度告密者描述土著味觉不熟悉的物品，为定义土著味觉和嗅觉词汇提供客观的比较基础。学生还将学习当地对药物功效的看法如何与当地疾病因果理论相联系，以及这些理论如何与西方药理学和医学知识相对应。方法包括民族医学健康普查，结构化和半结构化访谈，以及植物标本的收集和分析。将比较两个美洲印第安人群体的本土模式，以评估共享相似环境的不相关文化群体之间的差异程度。这项研究很重要，因为它将增加我们对世界上这一重要地区的专业知识，并将增进我们对土著人民如何选择和使用药用植物的了解。对土著人民使用的药用植物的研究尤其重要，因为它可能揭示新的疾病治疗方法，同时促进土著地区的文化和生态保护。

This award to the University of California-Berkeley funds the dissertation research of a cultural anthropologist in the Peruvian Amazon rain forest. The problem is to understand how native Americans identify medicinal plants in the forest. The student will assess native perceptions of specific cues of taste, smell, or feel (bitterness, sweetness, astringency, aromatic smell, prickly texture, etc. ) which are thought to indicate therapeutic efficacy. A `taste and smell` experiment will be conducted whereby Indian informants are asked to describe items unfamiliar to the native palate, to provide an objective, comparative basis for defining the indigenous vocabulary of taste and smell. The student will also study how native perceptions of medicinal efficacy relate to native theories of disease causation, and how these correspond to Western pharmacological and medical knowledge. The methods include an ethnomedical health census, structured and semi-structured interviews, and the collection and analysis of botanical specimens. The native models of two Amerindian groups will be compared, to assess the degree of variability across unrelated cultural groups sharing a similar environment. This research is important because it will add to our expertise about this important region of the world and will advance our knowledge of how native peoples select and use medicinal plants. The study of medicinal plants used by indigenous peoples is especially important because it may reveal new cures for diseases, while at the same time promoting cultural and ecological conservation in indigenous areas.