Research Articles (Anthropology and Sociology)

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Browsing by Author "Gibson, Diana"

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    Ethnobotanical survey of medicinal plants used to manage High Blood Pressure and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in Bitterfontein, Western Cape Province, South Africa
    (Elsevier, 2016) Davids, Denver; Gibson, Diana; Johnson, Quinton
    ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE: The aim of this study was to identify and document medicinal plants used to manage High Blood Pressure and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in Bitterfontein, Western Cape Province, South Africa. METHODS: One hundred and twelve (112) respondents were interviewed between August 2014 and September 2015 through semi-structured surveys to gather data on the percentage of people who had been diagnosed with High Blood Pressure and/or Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and to determine the frequency of medicinal plant and allopathic medicine use. Twelve (12) key respondents were subsequently selected, using a non-probability snowball sampling method. They were interviewed in-depth concerning their plant practices and assisted with plant collection. RESULTS: Twenty-four plant (24) species belonging to 15 families were identified for the management of High Blood Pressure and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus. The most frequently reported families were Asteraceae (20.8%), Lamiaceae (16.67%), Crassulaceae (8.33%) and Aizoaceae (8.33%). The remaining (45.54%) were evenly split over eleven families- Fabaceae, Amaryllidaceae, Anacardiaceae, Capparaceae, Geraniaceae, Apiaceae, Convolvulaceae, Apocynaceae, Rutaceae, Asphodelaceae and Thymelaeaceae. The most commonly used plant species overall was Lessertia frutescens (96.55%). The most frequently used plant parts included leaves (57.63%) roots/bulbs (15.25%) and stems (11.86%), mostly prepared as infusions or decoctions for oral administration. CONCLUSIONS: Medicinal plants are widely used by High Blood Pressure and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus sufferers. They employ diverse plant species to manage both conditions. In addition, some sufferers often use prescribed allopathic medication, as well as medicinal plants, but at different intervals. Despite high usage the plants identified are not currently threatened (Red Data list status: least concern).
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    Perceptions of traditional health practitioners on violence in the Helderberg Municipal Area, Western Cape
    (AOSIS OpenJournals, 2013) Gibson, Diana
    This study on perceptions of violence was conducted with 56 traditional health practitioners (diviners: amagrirha) in the Helderberg Municipal Area of Cape Town Metro. It forms a subsection of a larger study on African medicine. This particular research focuses on how traditional health practitioners perceive violence, including gender-related violence. Individual, in-depth interviews were done with 21 traditional health practitioners and focus group discussions were held with 35 participants. The paper reports on their understanding of, as well as the meanings attached to, community and gender-based violence in an urban setting. The traditional health practitioners related violence to a range of disconnections in society, ranging from not adhering to traditional norms and practices, to breaks in relations between parents and children, within families and in marital- and sexual relations. They referred to a general sense of disjuncture between the living and the ancestral worlds. The accumulative effect of this sense of not being connected was seen as damaging and a precursor to violence. In two sites where there were high concentrations of violence, ceremonies were held to purify the areas by ritual. In addition to attending to the physical manifestations of illness, distress and violence, these traditional health practitioners attempted to enhance and restore proper social relationships between the living, as well as between the living and the dead.
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    Rethinking medicinal plants and plant medicines
    (National Inquiry Services Centre, 2018) Gibson, Diana
    Because plants are perceived as sessile and immobile, they are often represented as objects or things in current literature. In this paper, I explore variations and shifts in research and literature since 2000 that reconsider the ways that plant-related ideas, expertise and practices intersect in multiple associations related to medicinal plants. I argue that, in their relationship with humans, plants have histories, are mobile and can also bring about political and other effects. I use ethnographic material from Namibia and the Western Cape of South Africa to review medicinal plants, by focusing on human-plant relations and the incorporation of plants as non-human subjects with non-intentional agency.