so I forgot to mention...
My Senegalese name in Médoune Fall.
I am in the middle of my third week here, which has not been so much fun since I brought back some friends of my GI tract from the village... but I'm getting better... slowly....
This week has been full of fun lectures!!! OMG! We had one about recycling/cleaning water using bacteria, as well as the need to respect ones culture when developing. The example given was about the people of Casamance, who have a tradition that when one is buried, various trees will be planted on the grave plot. The tree that thrives the most is the one that has absorbed the buried individuals spirit, and that tree is regarded as that person from that point on, and therefore as part of the community. You can imagine the problems that would emerge if the government permitted a company to cut down the trees...
The other was about the need to acknowledge ones cultural background when trying to cure him or her. You canot cure someone who is suffering from an illness that des not exist in western medicine with western medicine. For instance, if one is possessed then you cannot just throw some xanax at the person and hope that the spirit will leave. African medicine has an almost metaphysical view off the world, acknowledging the interconenctedness of everything. So basically when you are sick, the universe is sick.
Both of these seem to go very much along the theme of our independent study/service learning projects, which are based on "action research", or basically continuously analyzing ones actions and research as one continues on a given project. It's amazing that one has to be taught this, and it makes me wonder how horrible out of context the development of the past was.... I want to ask if it was white westerners going to a developing country and putting infastructure in place without knowing the culture but with good intentions, or was it more cynical. Was it westerners going to a country and developing it for the economic gain of private companies, disregaring the people that live there. I wish it was good intentions... but i have a feeling it was all about the money.
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sounds like you are having a lot of educational fun cody! aw man i wish i can use bacteria to clean my stuff...
ReplyDeletei'm a strong believer in holistic medicine, especially asian, as long as it works that is. if the traditional cures have no benefits what so ever except for being good for your spirit or soul or whatever i don't believe in that. i rather use western medicine if it means i'm going to live, thank you.
for example, when i was in China i have horrible cramps and i asked if they had an drugs for it like midol. they said they only had herbs... i was like wtf noooo. i would die of menstrual cramps if i didnt have mah midol.