This book deals with the values of medicinal plants and associated knowledge(s) in the field of bioprospecting in post-apartheid South Africa. Bioprospecting, the use of genetic or biological resources for commercial purposes, is a profit-oriented enterprise facing new challenges with the rise of human rights and biodiversity politics. This new situation has led to claims for political leverage made by indigenous communities, as well as to claims for national and local cultural identity and heritage. The picture presented here contributes to the widely discussed yet so far unresolved question of how to appropriately share benefits, and how to protect indigenous knowledge in this field.
Price: $45.00
Pages: 354
Publisher: transcript publishing
Imprint: transcript publishing
Publication Date:
02 June 2020
Trim Size: 8.86 X 5.83 in
ISBN: 9783837647945
Format: Paperback
BISACs:
SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, POLITICAL SCIENCE / History & Theory, MEDICAL / Pharmacy
»The book is valuable reading for those interested in the sociopolitical lives of medicinal plants and knowledge about them.«
Britta Rutert, born 1974, works as a research associate at Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin. She received her PhD from Free University Berlin in 2016. She is also an ethnographic researcher at the Open African Innovation Research (openAIR) Network.
Frontmatter 1
Contents 5
Acronyms and Abbreviations 11
Chapter I. Opening Pandora's Box: Bioprospecting in South Africa 15
Chapter II. Methodological, Theoretical and Spatial Reflections on Bioprospecting as a Field in Translation 35
Chapter III. Ambiguous Contact Zones: Politics, Economy and the Ethnographer 65
Chapter IV. "Our Knowledge Belongs to Our Ancestors": Topographies of Knowledge and the Question of Property 111
Chapter V. Transformative Science: From Muthi to Chemical Compound 157
Chapter VI. ABS - A Stony Path Towards Sharing: The Chances and Challenges of Access and Benefit Sharing 209
Chapter VII. Partial Solution: The Biocultural Community Protocol 245
Chapter VIII. Closing Pandora's Box: Conclusion 295
Bibliography 311
