Tarahumara Medicine: Ethnobotany and Healing among the by Fructuoso Irigoyen-Rascón,Alfonso Paredes

The Tarahumara, one among North America’s oldest surviving aboriginal teams, name themselves Rarámuri, which means “nimble feet”—and notwithstanding they stay in relative isolation in Chihuahua, Mexico, their agility in long-distance working is legendary around the globe. Tarahumara Medicine is the 1st in-depth look at the tradition that sustains the “great runners.” Having spent a decade in Tarahumara groups, in the beginning as a clinical scholar and finally as a doctor and cultural observer, writer Fructuoso Irigoyen-Rascón is uniquely certified as a consultant to the Rarámuri’s method of drugs and healing.

In constructing their therapeutic practices, the Tarahumaras interlaced spiritual lore, magic, and cautious observations of nature. Irigoyen-Rascón completely situates readers within the Rarámuri’s setting, describing not just their wellbeing and fitness and foodstuff but in addition the mountains and rivers surrounding them and key points in their tradition, from long-distance kick-ball races to corn beer celebrations and non secular dances. He describes the Tarahumaras’ curing ceremonies, together with their ritual use of peyote, and offers a complete description of Tarahumara conventional natural treatments, together with their botanical features, attributed results, and uses.

to teach what those practices—and the underlying techniques of overall healthiness and disease—might suggest to the Rarámuri and to the observer, Irigoyen-Rascón explores his topic from either an intruder and an insider (indigenous) point of view. via his balanced process, Irigoyen-Rascón brings to gentle relationships among the Rarámuri therapeutic procedure and traditional medication, and provides considerably to our wisdom of indigenous American healing practices.

because the so much whole account of Tarahumara tradition ever written, Tarahumara Medicine delivers readers entry to a global infrequently seen—at as soon as richly assorted from and inextricably attached with the guidelines and practices of Western medicine.