Transmission of knowledge and modernity in French Guyana: is traditional knowledge condemned?

AbstractThe Maroon Blacks aluku (Boni), descendants of the slaves who escaped the Dutch plantations in the xviii century, live at present along Maroni river in French Guyana. Their therapeutic system, far from being inspired by the shamanism of the neighbouring Amerindians, plunges its roots in Africa, and gives proof of a large capacity of creation, invention and adaptation in a new context. During the previous two centuries, the pharmacopoeia built up itself, enriched and passed on from generation to generation. But, presently one senses certain retention from the Elders to deliver their knowledge, and the young people are complaining that they no longer have access to traditional knowledge.To try to understand the reasons of this evolution, we shall begin by defining what is a pharmacopoeia, in the traditional context, and especially, to which type of power it gives access. We shall compare the traditional mode of transmission with that of the western school system, and shall look in which extent there is compatibility between traditional knowledge and modern knowledge. Finally, we shall see that if traditional knowledge is condemned, it is not so much in his content, than in his mode of creation and distribution. It is the sociocultural context that gives them a meaning, and the possibility of expression; if this one is weakened, it is in his reasons for existing that traditional knowledge is threatened