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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

medical pluralism, women's health, Ayurveda, allopathy, Andhra Pradesh

College

Family, Home, and Social Sciences

Department

Anthropology

Abstract

My research took place in Andhra Pradesh, South India, in Vishakhapatnam, or Visag, for short. I studied the interaction between Allopathy (Allopathy is one of the terms used to describe western medicine, or biomedicine) and Ayurveda(Ayurveda is the traditional Hindu medicine system used in India for over 2000 years). I was originally interested in how this interaction affected midwives and pregnant mothers in the small fishing village on the edge of the city. As with most ethnographic, qualitative research, my focus changed during the first few weeks as challenges presented themselves and I had to adapt based on the resources available to me. The first challenge I was presented with was the language barrier. Because of the limited time I had to work with a translator or train them on which specific details I needed translated, it was difficult to get the information I needed. It worked better to interview within the surrounding neighborhoods where people spoke English. This created a bias in my research that I became aware of towards the end of the research process: many of these people who spoke English in these neighborhoods were from within the same caste. In India, each caste often has different traditions, opportunities, and even lifestyle, which created a possible bias that I could not compensate for with the limited research time. I interviewed mostly within the Brahmin caste, which is considered to be the upper class. Given that I did not interview people in other caste groups, my research cannot speak to how Ayurveda is used in other castes or if it affects women to the same extent. This bias is one place the research could be expanded or continued in future years.

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