Abstract

HIROSE LOPEZ, Javier. Mayan traditional medicine: a knowledge in the verge of extinction?. Trace (Méx. DF) [online]. 2018, n.74, pp.114-134. ISSN 2007-2392.  https://doi.org/10.22134/trace.74.2018.174.

The strong impact of processes of globalization and migration over Mayan medical traditional knowledge has put this in a condition which is often considered as of “at strong risk”. Under the circumstances described several initiatives have arisen in an attempt to preserve this knowledge. The ethnographic information registered over a decade of ethnographic research (between 2001 and 2013) with traditional healers (h’mens, midwives, masseurs, bonesetters, herbalists) of the states of Yucatan, Campeche and Quintana Roo was gathered with the objective to find the possible causes of this condition. As this information was analyzed, in particular regarding the forms of generation and transmission of traditional medical knowledge Maya, we came to the conclusion that the so-called “at risk” condition of this knowledge has to be questioned, as well as the initiatives for its transmission and permanence.

Keywords : Mayan medicine; traditional knowledge; bio-cultural heritage; interculturality; intercultural education.