Cross-cultural adaptation in urban ethnobotany: the Colombian folk pharmacopoeia in London.

AIM OF THE STUDY: To investigate traditional health care practices and changes in medicinal plant use among the growing Colombian community in London. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Ethnobotanical fieldwork consisted of qualitative, in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 23 Colombians living in London and botanical identification of 46 plant species actively used as herbal remedies. Subsequently, research data were compared with literature on ethnobotany and traditional herbal medicine in the home country, using a framework on cross-cultural adaptation, adjusted for the purpose of this study. RESULTS: Similarities and discrepancies between data and literature are interpreted as potential indicators of continuity and loss (or deculturation) of traditional remedies, respectively. Remedies used in London that are not corroborated by the literature suggest possible newly acquired uses. CONCLUSIONS: Cross-cultural adaptation related to health care practices is a multifaceted process. Persistence, loss and incorporation of remedies into the Colombian folk pharmacopoeia after migration are influenced by practical adaptation strategies as well as by symbolic-cultural motives of ethnic identity.

Traditional medicines used by Pakistani migrants from Mirpur living in Bradford, Northern England.

BACKGROUND: Despite the increasing relevance of trans-cultural healthcare issues in public health policies, knowledge is still very restricted about migrant communities' perceptions and use of traditional medicines (TMs) within multicultural societies in Western countries. In this field study, an in-depth study was carried out of the herbal drugs still in use among Pakistani migrants from Mirpur living in Bradford, in the north of England. OBJECTIVES: To record TMs known and still used among Pakistani migrants from Mirpur presently living in Bradford; to assess the degree of overlapping between food and medicine in the provision of healthcare within domestic arenas among this community; to analyse how knowledge of TMs is changing among different generations and among the different waves of migrants who have moved from Pakistan to Bradford in the last few decades. METHODS: Semi-structured and focus-groups interviews with 37 members of the community, as well as other standard techniques of the ethnobiological investigations: free-listing, participant observation, and the collection and identification of the relevant plant material. RESULTS: TMs are still very popular amongst Pakistani migrants in Bradford, and are regularly delivered in domestic arenas. Two-thirds of the interviewees declared that they prefer TM treatments to conventional Western medicine. Fifty-six different remedies, mainly plant-based, are still used nowadays, and more than half of the recorded remedies represent food-medicines. However, knowledge of Mirpuri TMs is decreasing amongst the younger generations, and the level of knowledge of TMs seems to be dependent on the length of time since the migration from Pakistan took place. CONCLUSION: Public health policies and strategies aimed at improving migrants' health should take into account the perception and acceptance of plant-based TMs within domestic arenas among Pakistani migrants, and especially their use against diabetes. Concerns about eventual toxicity and side effects of traditional herbal drugs, as well as their interaction with pharmaceuticals, should be carefully considered, since a few of the herbal drugs quoted in this survey are little known in Western herbalism and in modern evidence-based phytotherapy.

Does the taste matter? Taste and medicinal perceptions associated with five selected herbal drugs among three ethnic groups in West Yorkshire, Northern England.

In recent years, diverse scholars have addressed the issue of the chemosensory perceptions associated with traditional medicines, nevertheless there is still a distinct lack of studies grounded in the social sciences and conducted from a cross-cultural, comparative perspective. In this urban ethnobotanical field study, 254 informants belonging to the Gujarati, Kashmiri and English ethnic groups and living in Western Yorkshire in Northern England were interviewed about the relationship between taste and medicinal perceptions of five herbal drugs, which were selected during a preliminary study. The herbal drugs included cinnamon (the dried bark of Cinnamomum verum, Lauraceae), mint (the leaves of Mentha spp., Lamiaceae), garlic (the bulbs of Allium sativum, Alliaceae), ginger (the rhizome of Zingiber officinale, Zingiberaceae), and cloves (the dried flower buds of Syzygium aromaticum, Myrtaceae). The main cross-cultural differences in taste perceptions regarded the perception the perception of the spicy taste of ginger, garlic, and cinnamon, of the bitter taste of ginger, the sweet taste of mint, and of the sour taste of garlic. The part of the study of how the five selected herbal drugs are perceived medicinally showed that TK (Traditional Knowledge) is widespread among Kashmiris, but not so prevalent among the Gujarati and especially the English samples. Among Kashmiris, ginger was frequently considered to be helpful for healing infections and muscular-skeletal and digestive disorders, mint was chosen for healing digestive and respiratory troubles, garlic for blood system disorders, and cinnamon was perceived to be efficacious for infectious diseases. Among the Gujarati and Kashmiri groups there was evidence of a strong link between the bitter and spicy tastes of ginger, garlic, cloves, and cinnamon and their perceived medicinal properties, whereas there was a far less obvious link between the sweet taste of mint and cinnamon and their perceived medicinal properties, although the link did exist among some members of the Gujarati group. Data presented in this study show how that links between taste perceptions and medicinal uses of herbal drugs may be understood as bio-cultural phenomena rooted in human physiology, but also constructed through individual experiences and culture, and that these links can therefore be quite different across diverse cultures.