Ecological Ethnobotany : Stumbling Toward New Practices and Paradigms

Ecological Ethnobotany:
Stumbling Toward New Practices and Paradigms
Submitted to:
Editors, MASA Journal
Department of Anthropology
435 Fletcher Argue Bldg.
University of Manitoba
Winnipeg, Manitoba
R3T 2N2
Submitted: January 14th, 2000
Revised: February 25th, 2000
Published: MASA Journal, Spring 2000, Volume 16(1): 1-13
Iain Davidson-Hunt
Natural Resources Institute
University of Manitoba
Winnipeg, Manitoba
R3T 2N2
dhunt@cc.umanitoba.ca
Iain J. Davidson-Hunt is a Doctoral Candidate in the Interdisciplinary Programme (Anthropology,
Botany and Natural Resources Management) at the University of Manitoba. He has worked with
rural peoples in Latin America, India and Northern Canada on the documentation of plant
knowledge and production/management systems. This work has also involved the development of
cooperative research programmes between rural producers and scientific research institutions.
Published work on the linkages between rural livelihoods, knowledge and resource management
agencies has appeared in Mountain Research and Development and Culture and Agriculture. Iain
is also a founding member of The Taiga Institute for Land, Culture and Economy based in Kenora,
Ontario. He is co-editor of a book which brings together the papers given at an international
conference hosted by The Taiga Institute on linking non-timber forest product businesses with
research and policy communities.

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Abstract
The practice of ethnobotany has changed over the past century since the coining of the term
ethnobotany by John Harshberger in 1896. This shift in practice is revealed through an
examination of current definitions of ethnobotany which emphasize ethnobotany as the study of
peoples= interactions with plants. The influence of ethnoecology has challenged ethnobotany to
adopt a more holistic and accountable perspective. An ecological ethnobotany is one possible
response to these critiques. Ecological ethnobotany may be tentatively defined as the relational
study of peoples= interactions with plants as situated in an ecological and social context. Concerns
with accountability have led both ethnobotanists, and the people with whom they work, to develop
codes of conduct. There is also a developing body of international law to which ethnobotanists
must be attentive. These developments within the practice of ethnobotany suggest that the
ethnobotany of the future will become more holistic in approach and based upon cooperative
research projects developed jointly between ethnobotanists and plant harvesters.
Introduction
This paper is based on a review of a number of ethnobotany texts in order to arrive at a
current understanding of ethnobotany and point to a future direction for the new millennium. Due
to the scope and breadth of ethnobotany it is impossible to discuss in detail the specific interests of
the discipline and associated methodologies. The approach taken in this paper is to first examine
the definition of ethnobotany put forward by various authors. There is a surprising degree of
consensus on the definition given the scope of the discipline. Next, the paper turns toward an
examination of how ethnoecology has influenced ethnobotany. Ethnoecology is often utilized both
as a specific term to distinguish a particular branch of the ethnosciences as well as provide more
of an epistemological and methodological challenge to the ethnosciences. This reflects the dual
role that ecology has played within the sciences in general as both a discipline and a critique of
Newtonian science (Berkes 1999). The critique of ecology, along with that of the people with
whom ethnobotany has often undertaken research, has led to a change in the practice of ethnobotany
during the 1990s. The paper examines whether this shift requires a change in the objectives of
ethnobotany or a more substantive change in its epistemology and methodology. The paper
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concludes by providing a reflection on a possible direction for changing ethnobotanical practice.
Definitions
Ethnobotany was a term first suggested by John Harshberger in 1896 to delimit a specific
field of botany as Athe use of plants by aboriginal peoples@ (Cited in Cotton 1996:1). Prior to the
use of the term ethnobotany many botanists were already including the use of plants by people
within their studies. One of Carl von Linné=s early publications was the Flora lapponica,
published in 1737, which included a discussion of the ways in which specific plants were utilized
by the Lapplander (Sami) people (Olsen and Svanberg 1998). However, it was Harshberger who
proposed that a discipline of ethnobotany might be developed with its own definition, scope,
objectives and methodologies (Cotton 1996). Although Harshberger=s (1896) definition and vision
still provide the core for the science of ethnobotany, it has also been reformulated through the
practice of ethnobotanists during the Twentieth Century. A slight change in emphasis can be seen
through a review of current definitions.
ethnobotany is considered to encompass all studies which concern the mutual
relationship between plants and traditional peoples. (Cotton 1996:1, original
emphasis)
In broad terms, ethnobotany is the study of the relationships between plants and
people. The two major parts of ethnobotany are encapsulated in the word itself:
Aethno,@ the study of people, and Abotany,@ the study of plants. Arrayed between
these two points labeled Aethno@ and Abotany@ lies a spectrum of interests ranging
from archaeological investigations of ancient civilizations to the bioengineering of
new crops. However, the field is limited on both sides. On the botanical side of
the field, few ethnobotanical studies are concerned with plants that have no
connection to people. On the ethno side, most studies are concerned with the ways
indigenous peoples use and view plants. And those uses and those views can
provide deep insights into the human condition. (Balick and Cox 1996:3)
Over this century the field [ethnobotany] has moved from the natural history of plant
uses by primitive peoples as observed by western scientists to a wide range of
interests of plants in cultural and ecological contexts. (Ford 1994:viii)
The ideal definition of ethnobotany is, in my view, a broad one. Since the term is
derived from ethno-, pertaining to Arace, people, cultural group, nation,@ and
botany, Athe science of plants,@ a logical definition is Athe science of people=s
interactions with plants.@ Some prefer to restrict the discipline to the study of
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aboriginal, pre-industrial peoples and their relationships with plants, but this
definition does not recognize the complex relationships and interdependence
between plants and modern societies of all types. It should be acceptable to study
ethnobotany among Canadian Chinese, Canadian Ukrainian, Asia American, and
Black American cultures as much as among modern Native American groups.
(Turner 1995:264, original emphasis)
As evident in Harshberger=s 1896 definition the early definitions of ethnobotany restricted
the field to the study of how aboriginal people used plants (Clément 1998). Botanists,
anthropologists, explorers, missionaries and other people who traveled the globe would see a
plant, identify/classify/name the plant for the purposes of science, ask a person the name of the
plant in the local language and/or list the local uses of the plant. This resulted in numerous
monographs on the AX@ cultural group uses of plants, such as, How Indians Use Plants for Food,
Medicine and Crafts (formerly titled Uses of Plants by the Chippewa Indians), written by Francis
Densmore in 1928. The particular focus of such monographs would vary depending upon the
specific interest (i.e., scientific classification, rituals, discovery, linguistics, commercial use and
etc.) of the person undertaking the study. While some would interpret these early foci of
ethnobotany as the articulation of colonial economies, imaginations and projects (Clément 1998),
it can also be seen as the basic data gathering stage of the ethnobotanical discipline. The puzzle, to
utilize Kuhn=s framework and terminology (Kuhn 1962), reflected in the early definition, was to
determine the spectrum of plants and uses and incorporate them into a comparative and universal
system of knowledge for economic, material and museological purposes (Clément 1998). This
narrow definition of ethnobotany can be seen to be carried on in the discipline of economic botany
which is still Adevoted to the past, present, and future uses of plants by people@ as expressed by the
banner on the Journal of Economic Botany. The discipline of ethnobotany, however, has become
a much broader discipline which, as shown in the recent definitions, is interested in all studies
about the relationship between people and plants.
Ford (1994[1978]) captured the expanding definition of ethnobotany in his 1994
introduction to the book, The Nature and Status of Ethnobotany, as shown in his definition quoted
above. In Ford=s (1994) conceptual, >tree ring= diagram of ethnobotany, Aall studies@ are defined as
including:
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1.
Useful Plants Formerly of primitive people but expanding to include
western and non-western cultures;
2.
Cognition of Plants
Folklore, linguistics and ethnoscience, world view and
social communication - gender, ethnicity, class; and,
3.
Ecology
Community interactions and human behavior -
conservation, genetic preservation.
It is interesting that ethnobotany has moved its focus from the use of plants by people to the
relationship between people and plants which includes use, cognition and ecology. In
comparison, economic botany has maintained a narrow focus on use while expanding its definition
to include all people. Recent definitions of ethnobotany (Balick and Cox 1996; Cotton 1996; Ford
1994; Turner 1995) demonstrate consensus on the move to include more than just use by focusing
on the relationship between people and plants. However, there is not consensus whether the
discipline should focus on all people (Ford 1994; Turner 1995), or Atraditional@, and/or
Aindigenous@ peoples (Balick and Cox 1996; Cotton 1996). Neither Cotton (1996) nor Balick and
Cox (1996) provide a clear argument as to why ethnobotany should be limited to Atraditional@
and/or Aindigenous@ peoples. Given recent discussions on the concepts of tradition (Borofsky
1987), culture (Appadurai 1997; Borofsky 1994; Friedman 1994), and science (Atran 1990;
Clément 1998) within the anthropological literature, the inclusion of Atraditional@ and/or
Aindigenous@ in the definition of ethnobotany is bound to raise more problems than it solves. It is
evident that people who have lived in one locale for a long time have particularly rich sets of
knowledge about and cognition of plants and local ecology (see for example, Berkes 1999; Berlin
1992; Turner 1974). A more fundamental issue in relation to knowledge, however, is found within
the discussion of the relationship between knowledge as practice and knowledge as heritage
(Borofsky 1987;1994; Ingold 1993). The specification of knowledge can only be undertaken
through empirical research. The dynamic relationship between people and plants and the mutually
constitutive nature of this relationship is one which likely exists among all people whether the
knowledge is practiced or gained through visits to museums. Definitions of ethnobotany such as
those proposed by Turner (1995) and Ford (1994), and which simply emphasize the dynamic and
mutually constitutive relationship between people and plants, point to the future of ethnobotany as
opposed to its past.
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Ethnobotany and Ethnoecology - Is a Holistic Ethnobotany Possible?
Ethnoecology has been utilized in at least three distinct ways in the ethnobotanical and
ethnobiological literature. The first emphasizes the perspective that ethnoecology is the sum of the
individual ethnoscience disciplines (i.e., ethnobotany, ethnozoology, ethnopedology and etc.)
Ethnoecology in this perspective becomes the broad discipline which unites the sub-disciplines
into a whole. This reflects a broader debate in ecology between the Newtonian and holistic
concepts of ecology. A Newtonian approach to ecology assumes that wholes can be constructed
from the parts (Odum 1983). Ecology has often been used within anthropology in this context
whereby the ecological setting forms an early chapter of an ethnology and is really used as a
synonym for environment. Specific studies on parts of the ecosystem are added together to provide
an understanding of the ecology. This is reflected by Martin in his description and definition of
ethnoecology.
As a discipline which integrates many diverse academic fields, ethnoecology is
having an impact on the way that basic and applied research is carried out. After
decades in which the natural sciences and even the social sciences have become
increasingly reductionistic, ethnoecology promises to give a holistic view of our
knowledge of the environment. This basic goal of natural history, nearly
abandoned in the quest for specialized knowledge in fields such as particle physics
and molecular genetics, is gaining new importance as scientists seek to understand
the ecological wisdom of local people.
The term ethnoecology is increasingly used to encompass all studies which
describe local people=s interaction with the natural environment, including
subdisciplines such as ethnobiology, ethnobotany, ethnoentomology and
ethnozoology. Ethnobotany refers to the study of the interactions between people
and plants. (Martin 1995:xx)
While striving for holism this approach misses the emphasis of Odum (1983) for the study
of ecology, and Malinowski (1973) for the study of culture, that the whole is understood by the
relationship among the parts not the addition of the parts. The whole has to be understood as an
independent abstraction with its own generative principles, relations of causality and dynamics but
not a primordial essence. The second way in which ethnoecology could be utilized is to follow
Clément=s (1998) suggestion that a narrow definition of the ethnosciences should focus on the
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science of X discipline as practiced by a local people. In this case ethnoecology would be the
science of how people understand the relationship between humans, animals, plants and physical
elements of a locale. A third way in which ethnoecology has been utilized is as a concept which
influences the practice of the ethnosciences. As Beaucage and Taller de Tradición Oral de
CEPEC in quoting Toledo (1992) note:
[Ethnoecology] is a meeting place for the various scholars and practitioners
interested in the dynamic relationships between humans and their environments,
whether they be biologists, agronomists, health or development specialists.
(1997:46)
This concept of ethnoecology is built upon the holistic line of thought within ecology. The main
emphasis is on the process in which people with different experiences and knowledges share their
expertise in order to build a holistic understanding of a geographic area such as a watershed. This
perspective of ethnoecology implies an epistemological and methodological shift for the
ethnosciences. For our epistemology, it suggests that the legitimacy and authority of knowledge
should not be restricted to scientific disciplines and institutions but should include the knowledges
and institutions of other people. Methodologically, it emphasizes that people should not be objects
of research in order to create Aetic@ or Aemic@ representations of peoples= knowledge, but should be
subjects/partners in a cooperative process of knowledge creation. Given the incentive structures
of scientific institutions this concept of ethnoecology will be difficult to implement, but does map
out a vision for future research.
My personal perspective is that ethnoecology has both specified relational knowledge held
by different societies (for example, Berkes 1999) as well as provided a challenge to those of us
involved in more specific ethnoscience endeavors, such as ethnobotany. However, I think there
are two approaches which may be followed in response to this challenge. First, we may use the
relationship between plants and people as the starting point for our research with the long term
objective of increasing the number of relationships that we include in our understanding of a
people or location. This is the spider web approach to holism. An individual starts constructing
the web at a center point but increasingly adds strands to the web in an outward pattern. Second,
we can utilize our specific knowledges of the relationship between people and plants to build a
holistic understanding of, say, a watershed in cooperation with other people. This second
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approach requires the recognition of the legitimacy and authority of other knowledges and
institutions within our epistemology, while working to create new knowledges and institutions
built through the cooperation of scientists and other people. Methodologically, the inclusion of
people as subjects, instead of objects, of research requires us to engage in processes of negotiation
in order to determine mutually beneficial objectives for theoretical and applied research projects.
Ethnoecology, in some of its variants, can be as mechanistic and reductionistic as any other
scientific discipline. In order to move towards an ecosystem perspective and a holistic
understanding of the relationships of an ecosystem the most important contribution of ethnoecology
is that it challenges us to reflect upon our epistemology and methodology in order to construct a
relational perspective. This is what some might term ecological ethnobotany or ethnobotany with
an ecosystem perspective.
Changing Ethnobotanical Practice
Clément (1998) has identified three stages in the history of ethnobotanical research which
he terms the Apreclassical@, Aclassical@ and Apostclassical@. Both the Apreclassical@ and Aclassical@
stage included an interest in documenting Athe economic use, vernacular nomenclature, and
systematic classifications@ of plants as well as broader interests such as the A...knowledge of
resources and how to manage them.@ (Clément 1998:163) Clément (1998) suggests that the practice
of ethnobotany shifted around 1950 when researchers moved from creating Aetic@ representations
of these topics to constructing Aemic@ representations. AEtic@ representations communicate the
researchers ideas about what people know about plants whereas Aemic@ representations are an
attempt by the researcher to interpret how people know what they know about plants. As has now
been made clear by anthropologists both require a moment of interpretation on the part of the
researcher (Clifford 1986). It is the shift to the Apost-classical@ stage during the 1990s (Clément
1998) which is reflected in the above discussion on ethnobotany and ethnoecology and reflects
Amarked cooperation between Western scientific researchers and Native peoples.@ (Clément
1998:163)
One of the striking characteristics of current ethnobotanical practice is the attempt to
include co-operative research and applied projects within the overall objectives of the discipline.
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This shift is reflected in a review of ethnobotanical texts. Ford=s (1994[1978]) book is a
compilation of key ethnobotanical papers from the mid to late Twentieth century which are all
focused on theoretical questions of interest to the discipline. By the 1990s the ethnobotanical texts
of Balick and Cox (1996); Cotton (1996) and Martin (1995) include discussions of: how to create
local benefits through ethnobotanical research; co-operative research projects; intellectual
property rights regarding ethnobotanical knowledge; and, ethnobotanical research ethics. AThe
Declaration of Belem@, presented in Table 1, was one of the first signals that a change was
occurring in the practice of ethnobotany. This declaration was developed as a self-regulating set
of guidelines during the AFirst International Congress of Ethnobiology held in 1988. It provides a
basic set of ethical guidelines for carrying out ethnobotanical research.
Since this original ethical statement many ethnobotanical researchers have proposed further
research guidelines, such as those shown in Table 2, which were developed by Gary Martin
(1995) for inclusion in an ethnobotanical research manual. Indigenous peoples and others have
also taken the initiative to indicate to ethnobotanical researchers what they expect when
researchers would like to undertake research with people of a community. An example of the type
of research that some indigenous people would like undertaken is show in Table 3 which contains
a statement from an indigenous trans-amazonian political institution. There have also been a
number of initiatives undertaken to reform international law in order to provide protection for
indigenous cultural and natural resources. As shown in Table 4 there has been a gradual
recognition of intellectual property rights for indigenous people in regards to cultural and natural
resources. However, the extent to which people hold intellectual property rights in law for genetic
material is limited by current patent laws and is still an evolving and vigorous area of debate
(Posey and Dutfield 1996). It should be clear at this time to most ethnobotanical researchers that
the critiques of ethnoecology and indigenous peoples, along with changes in social science ethics
and international law, will require the practice of ethnobotany to shift towards a collaborative
theoretical epistemology and an applied methodology. The challenge will be whether
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ethnobotanical researchers will be able to balance the commercial and academic demands of their
discipline with the need to work with people as research partners on cooperative knowledge
production and projects.
Toward New Ethnobotanical Practices
The definition and scope of ethnobotany has remained impressive even by the narrowest
definition of the discipline. As Turner (1995) notes in her review of ethnobotany the discipline
still undertakes research on the relationship between people and plants in the areas of: linguistics;
cognition; education; healing; nutrition; archeology; paleology; resource tenure and management;
and, livelihood. Clément (1998) is correct in identifying a shift during the 1990s whereby the
people with whom ethnobotanists traditionally undertake research have begun to demand more
accountability and cooperation from ethnobotanists. There are two possible responses to this
challenge. First, it is possible to retreat into historic documents, the mythic past and pollen grain
analysis to maintain the epistemological relationship between researcher and object. This allows
us to maintain a focus on our scientific puzzles, projects and technologies along with the discovery
of public domain knowledge with the potential for private commercial value. Second, it is
possible to enter the chaotic fray where research object becomes subject and requires from us
accountability and cooperative research projects. Those among us who have chosen this second
option, for philosophical or practical reasons, along with the people with whom we undertake
research do not have a clear path for how this type of ethnobotany should be practiced. I do think,
however, that some of the work done by ethnoecologists does provide a glimpse of what this path
may look like.
Ethnobotanical knowledge is what we bring to the meeting place where those people
interested in discovering, recovering and knowing local ecosystems, in an attempt to restore both
the cultural and ecological resilience and integrity of those places, gather. This requires us to
focus less on the boundaries between different types of knowledges and resources and more on
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