Herbal and Magical Medicine

Herbal and Magical Medicine draws upon perspectives from folklore, anthropology, psychology, medicine, and botany to describe the traditional medical beliefs and practices among Native, Anglo-, and African Americans in eastern North Carolina and Virginia. In documenting the vitality of such seemingly unusual healing traditions as talking the fire out of burns, wart-curing, blood-stopping, herbal healing, and rootwork, the contributors to this volume demonstrate how the region's folk medical systems operate in tandem with scientific biomedicine.the authors provide illuminating commentary on the major forms of naturopathic and magico-religious medicine practiced in the United States.