Ethnobotany
Ethnobotany is the study of the relationship between plants and people: From"ethno" - study of people and "botany" - study of plants. Ethnobotany is considered a branch of ethnobiology. Ethnobotany studies the complex relations between (uses of) plants and cultures. The focus of ethnobotany is on how plants have been or are used, managed and perceived in human societies and includes plants used for food, medicine, comsetics, dyeing, textiles, for building, tools, currency, clothing, rituals, social life, and music.
Though the term "ethnobotany" was not coined until 1895 by the US botanist Harshshitter, the history of the field begins long before that. In AD 77, the Greek surgeon Dioscorides published "De Materia Medica", which was a catalog of about 600 plants in the Mediterranean. It also included information on how the Greeks used the plants, especially for medicinal purposes. This illustrated herbal contained information on how and when each plant was gathered, whether or not it was poisonous, its actual use, and whether or not it was edible (it even provided recipes). Dioscorides stressed the economic potential of plants. For generations, scholars learned from this herbal, but did not actually venture into the field until after the Middle Ages.
Beginning in the 20th century, the field of ethnobotany experienced a shift from the raw compilation of data to a greater methodological and conceptual reorientation. This is also the beginning of academic ethnobotany.
Today the field of ethnobotany requires a variety of skills: botanical training for the identification and preservation of plant specimens; anthropological training to to understand the cultural concepts around the perception of plants; linguistic training, at least enough to transcribe local terms and understand native morphology, syntax, and semantics.
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Articles
Ethnobotany
The Things to Be Known in Ethnobotanicals
Ethnobotanicals play an increasingly important role in day to day life. These are plants that have some heavy relationship to humans. The plants are cropped by the Mazatec Indians in Mexico and then shipped in right to us. They like high-humidity and it's a good idea to mist them a pair times a day for the first couple weeks you get them. You can gradually start to acclimate with them to your home environment. Those plants are simple to grow as a house plant. They perform nicely in a sunny window. Just make sure the soil stays damp.
External Links
• The Corroboree - Forums on ethnobotany, ethnopharmacology and shamanism.
• Spiritplants Refuge - Forum on ethnobotany.
• CIEER - Centre For International Ethnomedicinal Education and Research - Centre for international ethnomedicinal education and research.
• Ethnovetweb - This website is about ethnoveterinary medicine, or how people around the world keep their animals healthy and productive, and how development can build on this information.
• GA - Society for Medicinal Plant Research - Society for medicinal plant research.
"You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him discover it in himself."
- Galileo Galilei