Mary Cameron

Transformations of Gender and Caste Divisions of Labor in Rural Nepal: Land, Hierarchy, and the Case of Untouchable Women

The article demonstrates how gender and caste divisions of labor in rural western Nepal have been historically linked with practices of social hierarchy and land distribution. Because of their low status in two hierarchies--caste and gender--untouchable women serve as handmaidens to the communitys changing economic needs. Over the past century, their primarily artisan-related production has been replaced with a variety of paid agricultural and nonagricultural work in the increasingly capitalized agricultural economy. The consequent breakdown of secure intercaste patron-client relationships and increasing poverty are countered by womens increasing economic power.

Land-Use and Socioeconomic Change, Medicinal Plant Selection and Biodiversity Resilience in Far Western Nepal.

Indigenous plant use-systems have evolved under, and constantly adapted to human and non-human impacts. In the last decades however, increasing socioeconomic and cultural transformations, including land-use change, outmigration, globalized markets, the introduction of new species, and climate change have led to a decreasing availability of indigenous resources, and are ultimately leading to a reduction of local use-knowledge. Participant observations, discussions, walks-in-the-woods, semi-structured interviews and informal meetings were carried out in 12 villages of far western Nepal between 2011 and 2015 to assess how sociocultural changes have affected the sustenance of indigenous systems and local biodiversity, when compared to studies carried out in the previous decades. Our findings show that there were no statistically significant differences in subject variable means, but differences were relatively important to plant parts-use and plant growth-forms (p = 0.183 and 0.088 respectively). Cissampelos pareira, Acorus calamus, Calotropis gigantea were found to have the greatest relative importance, whereas Ageratina adenophora, Melia azedarach, Carum carvi were most important based on use values. Among them, C. pareira and A. adenophora were introduced. The spatial distribution of species collected for medicine showed that all habitats were important for collection however, habitats close to villages were more favored. The use of non-indigenous and easily available species and more accessible habitats is becoming more prevalent as primary forests become increasingly overexploited, indigenous species become limited, and sociocultural cause of land use change expand. The utilization of indigenous and non-indigenous species and nearby habitats, although possibly affecting the quality of medicinal species, nonetheless reveals the dynamism of indigenous medicines as an adaptive asset mitigating human and non-human environmental changes.

Untouchable Healing: A Dalit Ayurvedic Doctor from Nepal Suffers His Country's Ills

Ayurvedic medicine thrives in Nepal. Even so, barriers of untouchability that have long prevented Dalits from establishing equal relationships with upper castes have made medical education out of reach for them. Hence, nearly all Ayurvedic practitioners are high caste men. Forty years ago, an “untouchable” man from the Himalayan foothills with a thirst for knowledge about Ayurveda traveled south into India where he changed his caste and “became” a Brahman for 14 years as he studied the theory and practice of Ayurvedic medicine in a Haridwar college. Rasalijis life story, recorded initially in 2000 and continued through 2007–2008, encompasses a period of rapid modernization that spawned a state health policy promoting biomedicine, a proliferation of pharmaceutical drugs, and a national election that swept the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist into power and saw an unprecedented 9 percent Dalits elected to the Constituent Assembly. This article presents Rasalijis current concerns with the state of medicine and social justice in Nepal.

Cross-cultural comparison of plant use knowledge in Baitadi and Darchula districts, Nepal Himalaya

BackgroundThis study seeks to better understand the human-nature interface and to measure the variability of plant use knowledge among cultures, through inter- and intracultural analyses. We compared plant collection, use, and management of two culturally distinct groups (Baitadi and Darchula) of the Nepal Himalaya. They inhabit different physiographic regions, yet share the same ecological landscape, environmental resources, and livelihood challenges. We hypothesized that the elderly, native, and traditional healers living in remote and rural places possess more diverse and detailed knowledge of plant use and conservation than young, non-native, and non-healers.MethodsA total of 106 people were contacted for interviews, and 100 (68 men and 32 women) agreed to share ethnobotanical, demographic, and socioeconomic information. They were asked about the three most important plants for their socioeconomic benefit, culture, primary health care, and livelihood.ResultsThe knowledge of plant collection, use, and its transfer was strongly associated with the cultural heritage whereas the ecogeographical condition influences the ways in which plants are collected and used. The divergent knowledge of plant collection, use, and transfer between the participants of Baitadi and Darchula was significantly (p < 0.001) attributed to the cultural heritage of the area. The low consensus of plant use (FiC 0–0.87; IASc 0–0.67) between Baitadi and Darchula district could be due to cultural divergence, varied accessibility, physiographic heterogeneity, and biodiversity uniqueness.ConclusionsDifferences in plant use knowledge may help in diversifying the strategies of plant use in accordance with the livelihood, culture, and environment, and therefore, more studies measuring these aspects can further the ecosystem and cultural health of the region.

Gender, Science, and Indigenous Medicine: Planning Research on Asian Women Professional Providers

Womens health care prospects around the world depend on many factors, including broad social changes involving how gender dimensions within traditional medicine are transformed by global biomedicine. I propose a model that will help us to evaluate international health care transformation in Asia through understanding the specific impact of biomedicine on women practitioners of indigenous medicine. I suggest in the model that the relationship among gender, indigenous medico-science, and biomedicine is shaped by culture-specific and historical gender organization, the gendered knowledge foundations of indigenous medicine, and modernizing biomedical and Western science influences.