AFRICAN TRADITIONAL PLANT KNOWLEDGE IN THE CIRCUM-CARIBBEAN REGION
2003; SAGE Publishing; Volume: 23; Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2162-4496
Autores Tópico(s)African history and culture studies
ResumoThe African diaspora to the Americas was one of plants as well as people. European slavers provisioned their human cargoes with African and other Old World useful plants, which enabled their enslaved work force and free ma- roons to establish them in their gardens. Africans were additionally familiar with many Asian plants from earlier crop exchanges with the Indian subcontinent. Their efforts established these plants in the contemporary Caribbean plant corpus. The recognition of pantropical genera of value for food, medicine, and in the practice of syncretic religions also appears to have played an important role in survival, as they share similar uses among black populations in the Caribbean as well as tropical Africa. This paper, which focuses on the plants of the Old World tropics that became established with slavery in the Caribbean, seeks to illuminate the botanical legacy of Africans in the circum-Caribbean region. RESUME.—La diaspora africaine aux Ameriques ne s'est pas limitee aux person- nes, elle a egalement affecte les plantes. Les traiteurs d'esclaves ajoutaient a leur cargaison humaine des plantes exploitables dAfrique et du vieux monde pour les faire cultiver dans leurs jardins par les esclaves ou les marrons libres. En outre les Africains connaissaient beaucoup de plantes dAsie grace a de precedents echanges de cultures avec le sous-continent indien. Grace a leurs efforts, ces plan- tes occupent maintenant une place importante dans la flore des Cara'ibes. La reconnaissance par les esclaves de plantes de genres pan-tropicaux ayant des va- leurs nutritives, medicinales, et religieuses, semble egalement avoir joue un role important dans la survie des esclaves; les populations noires des Caraibes et dAfrique tropicale utilisent ces plantes de la meme fagon. Cette etude, consacree aux plantes tropicales du vieux monde introduites aux Caraibes par 1'esclavage, a pour but de mettre en evidence 1'heritage botanique des africains dans la region. RESUMO.—A diaspora africana nas Americas constituiu-se de um processo de dispersao tanto de pessoas quanto de plantas. Juntamente com os carregamentos de escravos os exploradores europeus abasteciam suas naus transatlanticas com plantas originarias da Africa e do Velho Mundo; isto permitiu que tanto escravos quanto negros libertos as cultivassem em suas hortas e pomares. Os africanos tinham familiaridade, tambem, com muitas das especies de plantas e especiarias utilizadas no fluxo de trocas comerciais e culturais com a India. A pertinacia e o ardil dos povos africanos contribuiriam para a inclusao destas plantas na botanica contemporanea do Caribe. O reconhecimento de especies pantropicais de valor nutritive, medicinal e religioso parece, tambem, ter desempenhado um papel im- portante na sobrevivencia deste legado botanico. Sao exemplos disto as aplicagoes e usos de praticas culturais semelhantes, tanto no Caribe quanto na Africa Trop-
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