INDIGENOUS MEDICINE AS A SOCIAL NORMATIVE INSTRUMENT: THE EXAMPLE OF THE NAVAJO SICK BODY

Abstract

Traditional medicine can sometimes assign a role of transgressor to the person who shows the signs of illness. Physiological and psychological disorders become symptomatic of a mistake committed by the patient who did not abide by the teachings transmitted in the sacred stories. This carelessness or deliberate transgression enables the illness to manifest itself to the ethnic or religious community the sick person belongs to. An analysis of some Navajo myths featuring the figure of the sick person will show that Navajo etiology and traditional therapeutics are based on two phenomena: the acknowledgment of the existence of sociosomas (illnesses resulting from a conflictive interaction with the cosmos) and exclusion or inclusion patterns. Lastly, a reflection on the integration of traditional therapeutics into what can be labelled mainstream or Anglo medicine will try to
show that the Navajo patient is more than often considered as a deviant individual
who proves unable to respect any norms, be they traditional or Anglo.