Traditional Healing in South Africa
Why is it important?• World Health Organization in 1970’s concluded that traditional
healing systems have intrinsic utility and should be developed for the wider use/benefit of mankind
• It can solve certain cultural health problems• It contributes to science and universal medicine• It is historically tested and contextually relevant knowledge
developed and passed on through generations• Healers are respected in the community because they have an
intuitive understanding of the conflicts that are common in their culture and they participate in the worldview of their patients
• Research shows that a number of other countries rely on consultations with traditional healers
South African Healers
Traditional Healer• Use of traditional herbs
and medicines• Contacts spiritual
ancestors• May act as a medium
with spirits.• They play an important
social role within communities
Faith Healer• Integrates religious and
traditional contexts based mainly on Christian healing principles• Holistic understanding of
health and wellness• An individual must be in
harmony with themselves, their body, family society, spirits and God.
Herbalist
South African HealersHerbalists
• Not mystically called to their profession• Decide to apprentice for an established herbalist
who will accept them an teach them • Resemble Westerns societies pharmacists• Have a knowledge of a vast array of plants, roots
and other substances
South African Healers
Witchcraft• Emphasis on supernatural power for evil• Used to harm others or help oneself at the
expense of others• A person is labelled a ‘witch’ and would not
identify themselves as such• Jealousy perhaps the most common driving
force• Confusion surrounds magical force as it can be
used as both for good an evil
Prevalence of Healers• 24.8% of black urban South Africans favour Faith Healers while
24% favour Traditional Healers• 28% of patients in a Johannesburg psychiatric hospital
admitted to seeing a traditional healer prior to admittance
Right: Phephisile Maseko, National Coordinator of THO, with a Western health practitioner
The West vs The rest
Thwasa (rite of passage)• A person is ‘called’ by their
ancestral spirits• Spirits visits person through
dreams and/or animals• They accept the illness and
become initiates for a period of three to five years
• Training involves dance, dreams, songs and ceremonial rites
Western perspective• Calling is associated with sickness
and disintegration• Dreams regarded as
subconscious interpretations• Psychiatry believes symptoms
represent schizophrenia, epilepsy, psychosis or a psychoneurotic condition
• Anthropology views it rather as ‘spiritual emergency” that can result in psychological well-being
Western Perspectives
• Emphasis on spirits, animal familiars, medicines from bizarre ingredients, outlandish garbs worn by some diviners and herbalist and the fear of witches all seem far removed from the clinical procedures and logical thought sequences of western medicine
THOKOZANI BOGOGO NABOMKHULU!
(“Praise/Hail the respected Elders!”)
Traditional Healers Organizations • "THO is an organisation that organises, trains and certifies
traditional health practitioners. It fights for member’s rights to practice the tradition of healing. We also assure the values, quality of treatment, efficacy, safety and ethical standards of member practitioners. Empowering healers of Africa to heal the continent".
• http://www.traditionalhealth.org.za/t/traditional_healing_and_law.html
Contact List• Tony Dold - Curator of the Selmar Schonland Herbarium,
Grahamstown, Lecturer of Botany at Rhodes University• Michelle Cocks – Researcher at Institute for Social and
Economic Research, Lecturer of Anthropology at Rhodes University
• Siyazama Pre-School Project, LM Mtwalo (email [email protected]) – VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUvPhiSUR0o
• Traditional Health Organisation Secretariat – [email protected]
Angles
• Liminality – the space in-between• Western vs Traditional practices• Legitimizing traditional healing as a practice• Stigma against Traditional and Faith healers and
debunking myths• Western (mis)understandings of psycho-spiritual
practices • Development of traditional healers through
thwasa
Consultation room for vumisa
Traditional medicines