African Local Knowledge & Livestock Health : Diseases & Treatments in South Africa

A much needed examination of contemporary approaches to animal healing in South Africa, and the role of local knowledge. Understanding local knowledge has become a central academic project among those interested in Africa and developing countries. In South Africa, land reform is gathering pace and African people hold an increasing proportion of thelivestock in the country. Animal health has become a central issue for rural development. Yet African veterinary medical knowledge remains largely unrecorded. This book seeks to fill that gap. It captures for the first time the diversity, as well as the limits, of a major sphere of local knowledge. Beinart and Brown argue that African approaches to animal health rest largely in environmental and nutritional explanations. They explore the widespread use of plants as well as biomedicines for healing. While rural populations remain concerned about supernatural threats, and many men think that women can harm their cattle, the authors challenge current ideas on the modernisation of witchcraft. They examine more ambient forms of supernatural danger expressed in little-known concepts such as mohato and umkhondo. They take the reader into the homesteads and kraals of rural black South Africans and engage with a key rural concern - vividly reporting the ideas of livestock owners. This is groundbreaking research which will have important implications for analyses of local knowledge more generally as well as effectivestate interventions and animal treatments in South Africa. William Beinart is Rhodes Professor of Race Relations, African Studies Centre, University of Oxford; Karen Brown is an ESRC Research Fellow at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford. Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Swaziland): Wits University Press Frontcover Contents Acknowledgements Abbreviations Names of Common Diseases List of Maps, Photographs & Tables 1 Introduction: African Local Knowledge & Veterinary Pluralism Key contributions Context: livestock diseases in South African history Our research Historiography: towards medical and environmental pluralism Local knowledge and its limits Understanding the causes and symptoms of livestock diseases Livestock in African hands Conclusion 2 Ticks, Tick-borne Diseases & the Limits of Local Knowledge Introduction Scientific understandings of ticks and efforts at control From state compulsion to individual responsibility – the changing role of the state in relation to dipping Local knowledge about ticks and tick control Conclusion 3 ‘The Grave of the Cow is in the Stomach’: Environment & Nutrition in the Explanation & Prevention of Livestock Diseases Introduction Old and new diseases Identifying infection: (a) the problem of naming Identifying infection: (b) contested clinical symptoms and post-mortem findings Ideas about contagion, isolation and immunity Environment and the seasonality of diseases Conclusion 4 Transhumance, Animal Diseases & Environment The context of transhumance Transhumance and disease The demise of transhumance: processes and arguments Transhumance and grazing in Mbotyi Trekking between mountains and plains in QwaQwa Cattle posts in North West Province Conclusion 5 Plants & Drugs: Medicating Livestock Introduction: plants and biomedicines The transfer of local knowledge: specialists, generations and gender Transmission of biomedical knowledge and medicine Choices of medicine: local medicines, biomedicines and other forms of treatment Conclusion 6 Medicinal Plants: Their Selection & their Properties Choice of plants Plant medicines in North West Province Plant medicines in QwaQwa Plant medicines in the Eastern Cape Conclusion 7 Animal Health & Ideas of the Supernatural Introduction: Witchcraft and the ambient supernatural Animal deaths and diseases associated with witchcraft The ambient supernatural: Umkhondo in Mpondoland Milking and the supernatural in Mbotyi Conclusion 8 Gender, Space & the Supernatural Introduction Mohato in contemporary cattle-owning communities Ideas about pollution and cattle disease in QwaQwa Practices and challenges Muthi to protect the kraal and the cattle Conclusion 9 Conclusion The dynamics of local knowledge The limits of local knowledge Recommendations for policy and practice Appendices Appendix 1: Recommendations Appendix 2: African Ideas about Diseases and Conditions Associated with the Environment Appendix 3: African Ideas about Supernatural Causation Appendix 4: Plants and Diseases Appendix 5: Non-Plant Remedies Select Bibliography Index Backcover Understanding local knowledge has become a central academic project among those interested in Africa and developing countries. In South Africa, land reform is gathering pace and African people hold an increasing proportion of the livestock in the country. Animal health has become a central issue for rural development. Yet African veterinary medical knowledge remains largely unrecorded. This book seeks to fill that gap. It captures for the first time the diversity, as well as the limits, of a major sphere of local knowledge. Beinart and Brown argue that African approaches to animal health rest largely in environmental and nutritional explanations. They explore the widespread use of plants as well as biomedicines for healing. While rural populations remain concerned about supernatural threats, and many men think that women can harm their cattle, the authors challenge current ideas on the modernisation of witchcraft. They examine more ambient forms of supernatural danger expressed in little-known concepts such as mohato and umkhondo. They take the reader into the homesteads and kraals of rural black South Africans and engage with a key rural concern - vividly reporting the ideas of livestock owners. This is groundbreaking research which will have important implications for analyses of local knowledge more generally as well as effective state interventions and animal treatments in South Africa. William Beinart is Rhodes Professor of Race Relations, African Studies Centre, University of Oxford; Karen Brown is an ESRC Research Fellow at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford. Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Swaziland): Wits University Press Understanding local knowledge has become a central academic project among those interested in Africa and developing countries. In South Africa, land reform is gathering pace and African people hold an increasing proportion of the livestock in the country. Animal health has become a central issue for rural development. Yet African veterinary medical knowledge remains largely unrecorded. This book seeks to fill that gap. It captures for the first time the diversity, as well as the limits, of a major sphere of local knowledge. Beinart and Brown argue that African approaches to animal health rest largely in environmental and nutritional explanations. They explore the widespread use of plants as well as biomedicines for healing. While rural populations remain concerned about supernatural threats, and many men think that women can harm their cattle, the authors challenge current ideas on the modernisation of witchcraft. They examine more ambient forms of supernatural danger expressed in little-known concepts such as 'mohato' and 'umkhondo'. They take the reader into the homesteads and kraals of rural black South Africans and engage with a key rural concern - vividly reporting the ideas of livestock owners. This is groundbreaking research which will have important implications for analyses of local knowledge more generally as well as effective state interventions and animal treatments in South Africa. William Beinart is Rhodes Professor of Race Relations, African Studies Centre, University of Oxford; Karen Brown is Research Associate at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford. South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Swaziland: Wits University Press