Healing Plants: Medicine of the Seminole Indians - Book Review

By Alice Micco Snow and Susan Enns Stans. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2001. 134 pp. Illus. 21.50 [pounds sterling] (hbk). ISBN 0-8130-2062-X

It is a pleasure to review this delightful book co-written by Alice Snow, a woman in her seventies who has spent much of her life using her Seminole knowledge of medicinal plants, and Susan Stans, an anthropologist who has lived as a friend in Alice's community for two years. The result of this collaboration is a book rich in ethnobotanical information, well and clearly presented, and enhanced by the introductory chapters giving the social history and background of the Florida Seminole Indians.

The story is told simply and with no attempt to idyllicise a way of life that is rapidly disappearing. Effects of Westernisation, both good and bad, are remarked on. Alice Snow herself is a woman of few illusions, anxious to preserve the old knowledge while accepting that change is inevitable. As a child, she had the foresight to appreciate the importance of learning to speak English, despite being discouraged by her parents' generation from attending school. Her resulting knowledge of English has enabled her to act as interpreter and go-between for her people during a lifetime that has witnessed enormous changes. In addition to rearing her family, Alice has worked in a large number of jobs, apart from her unpaid work with herbs.

The materia medica that Alice draws upon is more limited than that reported a generation earlier by Sturtevant, a fact that emphasises the importance of preserving such knowledge before it is all irrevocably lost. Her knowledge of healing plants has been handed down from her mother and grandmother, and she has been determined to preserve it. This book was written despite some opposition from older members of her community. As Alice herself says, all she is telling is the names of plants; she does not claim to convey the whole system of healing. Her own role is that of assistant, collecting the plants that are then taken to a medicine man who empowers them. The overlap that is reported between Western medicine and the traditional healing methods is interesting too: sometimes one is used, sometimes the other, and sometimes a combination of both.

Susan Stans has skilfully and unobtrusively painted in the background information concerning the recent history of the Seminoles and the life story of Alice Snow. Her obvious friendship with Alice changes what could be a dull outsider's account to a sympathetic portrait of Alice's background and history. Family photographs enhance the account.

A further great strength of the book is the trouble that has been taken to identify the plants by their Mikasuki and Creek names, as well as their English and botanical names. There are some delightful line drawings and, at the end of the book, excellent colour photographs of all the plants mentioned, together with important notes on the details of collection methods, which parts of the plant are harvested, and where they are likely to be found.

I strongly recommend this book not only to anthropologists or botanists, but also to anyone interested in obtaining an authentic insight into a lifestyle unknown to most of US.

Gabrielle Hatfield, Folklore Society

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