What is Ethnobotany?
lets break it down and simplify
As most people know, I am an ethnobotanist. Starting my journey with a Master’s of Science from the University of Kent, I am lucky enough to travel the world researching, studying and lecturing about botanical and environmental subjects. My work has taken me across Oceania through New Zealand, Indonesia, The Cook Islands, and Australia, over to the British Virgin Islands, California, Quebec, Vermont, England and soon to be Brazil.
Hilariously, the question I get the most often is…WHAT IS ETHNOBOTANY? If you are sitting here, knowing me for years or new to this page, don’t worry, you are not alone. So, this post is all about breaking down the subject of ethnobotany. I am giving all the readers a free crash course, taking material from an actual sold-out course I taught at the Alchemist’s Kitchen. And, if you have any further questions or something to add, do not hesitate to comment on this thread and start a community discussion to help enhance the learning process for everyone!
1. What is Ethnobotany?
2. Why we need this field?
3. History/notable Ethnobotanists
4. Example case study
5. Botanical/anthropological vernacular
6. Tools & methods
7. Cultural competency
8. Limitations
9. How to get involved/resources
1. WHAT IS ETHNOBOTANY?
Ethno refers to people, culture, a culture’s collective body of beliefs, aesthetic, language, knowledge, and practice, while botany refers to the study of plants.
Together, ethnobotany is the study of the relationship between humans and plants, primarily in cultural settings.
Modern ethnobotany is an interdisciplinary field drawing together scholars from every subject. Ethnobotanical studies range from archaeological investigations of the role of plants in ancient civilizations to the bioengineering of new crops. This means that the subject is not limited to non industrialized or non urbanized societies. Although my work takes me to more remote and rural areas, ethnobotanical work exists in modern society too. The truth is the co-adaptation of plants and human cultures has changed—and perhaps intensified—in the context of urbanization and globalization in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Nonetheless, indigenous, non-Westernized cultures play a crucial role in ethnobotany, as they possess botanical wisdom gained through centuries of interaction with the environment.
2. WHY WE NEED THIS FIELD
To learn to stop looking at nature as the “other"
To develop mutually beneficial relationships with earth
To honor the plant kingdom as wisdom keepers
To protect plant species and indigenous cultural rights
To learn from and honor indigenous cultures
To learn about cultural competency, where we work and teach with consent and respect
To translate plant communication
To encourage an awareness of the link between biodiversity and cultural diversity
To study indigenous food production and local medicinal knowledge, as it may have practical implications for developing sustainable agriculture and discovering new medicines
To teach about proper intention with psychedelic/entheogenic medicine
HISTORY
The 1700s was the peak of botanical exploration, with the modern discipline of ethnobotany beginning to emerge in the late nineteenth century. This was in part out of field-work concentrated in the North American West. Later, interest in ethnobotany increased substantially in the 1990s and by the early 2000s, several universities around the world offered graduate programs in ethnobotany, and undergraduate programs were becoming more common and it was an accepted academic field.
*This is a history of the academic subject. Ethnobotany has existed for thousands of years outside western academia.
*These are ethnobotanists in the ACADEMIA sphere. Real ethnobotanists are the voodoo practitioners, witch doctors, medicine women, indigenous people of color.
CASE STUDY
Typically, one of the outcomes of scientific research is writing a case study. If the research relates to sustainability, protection or conservation, it’s very important that the researcher is listening to what kind of conservation techniques are viable for each local community through their own words and needs. In terms of an ethnobotanist coming into an area and wanting to protect biodiversity, we cannot assume we need to teach. We need to work together to find a solution with local communities if a plant is being over-harvested or near extinction/endangerment. This encroaches on another fascinating subject political ecology; and the three types of conservation models: fortress, co-management and neoliberal.
Example of a case study
BOTANICAL & ANTHROPOLOGICAL VERNACULAR
ETHNOBOTANICAL TOOLS & METHODS
Tools in fieldwork
Botany
Mycology
Taxonomy (ways of categorizing)
Anthropology
Ethnography
Archaeology (including colonial socio-economic histories, or the roots of our modern social movements)
Comparative traditional knowledge
Religious studies
Medicine
Chemistry
Pharmacology
Realms of ritual, mythology and cosmology
Important methods
Data collection
Critique case studies
Participant observation method
Market method
Household survey method
Interviews, questionnaires, workshops and focus groups
Language understanding
Identify, collect and process plant material into herbarium voucher specimens
Plant identification and classification
Training/Considerations
Literature vs herbaria vs field studies
Observation
emic vs etic perspective
emic - researcher gains the insider’s point of view
etic - researcher looks at the research field objectively from a distance
Intellectual property rights
Botanical training
for the identification and preservation of plant specimens
Anthropological training
to understand the cultural concepts around the perception of plants
Linguistic training
to transcribe local terms and understand native morphology, syntax and semantics
folk classification (refers to how members of a language community name and categorize plants and animals)
CULTURAL COMPETENCY
Important takeaways
We are not coming in to impart our privilege or teach.
We are learning, but this still means we cannot exploit or steal knowledge.
Balance of learning without taking
Many indigenous cultures have connections to the land that stem from their spiritual, physical, and cultural relationships with nature; we should be listening and believing that these bonds exist.
Interconnection with nature should be the same as interconnection with society.
Using taxonomy and linguistics, we have created an “other.”
Methods
Give back
Spend time with the culture
Be a part of the community
Build trust
Hard enough as a women researcher (respect cultural norms)
Perhaps through a connection?
Study the plant without intention to steal
What alkaloids, antioxidants, properties etc. does this plant have?
How can we compare that to something that grows locally? Think sustainability!
Intertwine the spiritual and practical
LIMITATIONS
Gender
Discrimination
Being a women or even person of color in this field can be difficult when trying to remain culturally competent.
Exploitation
Protection, biopiracy, western conservation models
Often there are third parties who have no direct link with the indigenous communities. This situation fuels the need for socio-ethnobotany, a new sub discipline of ethnobotany that deals with the question of how indigenous people can be compensated for sharing their ethnobotanical knowledge.
Funding
Where and how?
How to get funding for this subject that intertwines spiritual and indigenous culture with science. Finding grants and funding, especially during post-COVID19.
RESOURCES
Schools
University of Kent
Frostburg State University (bachelors)
Washington State University
University of British Columbia
University of Alaska Fairbanks
University of Hawaii Manoa
University of Wisconsin Madison (summer program)
University of Eldoret
Evergreen College
University of Victoria
Cornell University
Rutgers (certificate program)
James Cook University
University of Copenhagen
University of Redding (PhD research opportunity)
Websites
https://ethnobiology.org/
https://www.tea-assembly.com/
http://botanicaldimensions.org/
https://ashs.org/
https://www.kew.org/
https://www.botany.org/
http://www.iceers.org/
http://www.ethnobiology.net/
https://www.econbot.org/
https://www.imc.fund/#Hero
https://emergencemagazine.org/
https://www.risinghearts.org/
https://indigenouspeoplesmovement.com/
https://indigenousyouth.org/
https://www.indigenousclimateaction.com/
https://unitedplantsavers.org/
Hello Molly,
I have been looking for Universities that offer a course on the lines of Ethnobotany. Thank you so much for the detailed post. Cool write-up!
Krithika
Molly, you did it again. A written documentary backed by such a rich research. Thank you!