Gender Politics in the Distribution of Therapeutic Herbal Knowledge

Abstract

Data on the distribution of knowledge about medicinal plants in an indigenous Mexican community challenge several assumptions at the heart of medical anthropology concerning the distribution of therapeutic herbal knowledge. Contrary to expectation, many men in the community were knowledgeable about medicines for managing reproduction and women's reproductive health problems, and men more acculturated to the national society were particularly likely to know about plants containing chemicals that contribute toward their purported effects. Also contrary to expectation was the fact that older people were no more likely than younger ones to be knowledgeable about herbal remedies for reproductive health. Nor was prior illness experience necessarily associated with increased therapeutic herbal knowledge. Furthermore, although women who were socially integrated controlled more therapeutic herbal knowledge than those who were more isolated, the same was not true of men. These findings not only demonstrate the value of taking the gender‐based distribution of power into account in analyses of intracultural variation, but they also raise questions about theories currently used to explain intracultural variation.