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The Use of Home Remedies for Health Care and Well-Being by Spanish-Speaking Latino Immigrants in London: A Reflection on Acculturation

Publication Type  Book Chapter
Authors  Melissa Ceuterick; Ina Vandebroek; Bren Torry; Andrea Pieroni
Year of Publication  2007
Editor  Andrea Pieroni; Ina Vandebroek
Book Title  Traveling Cultures and Plants: The Ethnobiology and Ethnopharmacy of Migrations
City  Oxford
Publisher  Berghahn Books
Pages  145-165
Language  English
Key Words  acculturation; demedicalization; disease; home remedies; Latino immigrants; London; medical anthropology
Notes   Anthropological studies among Latinos in London are rare, and the research discussed in this chapter sheds light on the plant-based health care practices of this particular group of urban immigrants. During nine months of fieldwork from September 2005 to May 2006, the researchers interviewed a sample population in order to explore the ways that their plant use has changed while living in the London metropolitan area as compared to how it was in their country of origin. Though the immigrants come from various Spanish-speaking countries, a self-representational pan-Latino identity unites them as one general, yet not officially recognized, ethnic group in the British context. The chapter includes an ethnographic background accounting for this. Qualitative research methods were used to gather data from thirty-five informants, mostly from Andean countries. Along with participant observation, interviewing was the main research method and included open-ended interviews, semi-structured interviewsi, casual conversations and group interviews. The study zone's principal Latino herbal shop was visited repeatedly and a complete inventory of its herbs was recorded and samples of each herb were taken. The researchers identified the samples using a collection of books and reference literature. Significant emic distinctions between the terms disease, illness and discomfort, and the categories of remedies informants sought for each, were discovered. Medical anthropology theories on demedicalization of certain disorders are discussed to explain corresponding health care strategies. Some of these cultural distinctions make the UK's National Health Service (NHS) incompatible with Latino needs. Also, many of these immigrants are undocumented and unable to benefit from the NHS. Citing theoretical health care models, the authors propose that Latinos in London have the choice to seek treatment in three different arenas: the professional biomedical sector, the folk/specialist sector and the popular/lay sector. This research highlights the popular sector, which is mainly characterized by self-treatment. The authors divide the plant-based home remedies that their informants mentioned into four categories: (1) medicinal herbs; (2) food-medicine continuum; (3) ritual; and (4) cosmetic. In comparison to the plants that informants said they used in their home country, the quantity and diversity of home remedies they used in the UK is far less – in total, 196 remedies in the former and 66 in the latter. Most of the latter come from globalized, non-Latin American species. The authors discuss processes of acculturation and note that assimilation to highly culturally heterogeneous urban environments is a contradiction in terms. Here, acculturation in relationship to home remedy use is seen to be guided by practical choices and limitations, rather than negotiations of ethnic identity. Constraints pertaining to linguistics, busy schedules, work and age affect plant remedy use, but the main factor limiting diversity of plant remedy use was found to be the UK's harsh importation laws that prohibit immigrants from accessing many of their traditional herbs. Prepared by Megan Glore

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