Current use of wild plants with edible underground storage organs in a rural population of Patagonia: between tradition and change

Conclusion: For the Mapuche people, wild plants have constituted material and symbolic resources of great importance in their historical subsistence. In addition, they are currently being redefined as elements which present a connection with ancestral practices, produce a strong relationship with the ‘land’, and become markers which identify the ‘natural’ (historical) ways of their people; these are key elements in the current political processes of identity revaluation. This research is valuable to stimulate cultural revival and health promotion programs in the communities with their own local, cultural food.
Source: Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine - Category: Complementary Medicine Authors: Source Type: research