“Something Born of the Heart”: Culturally Affiliated Illnesses of Older Adults in Oaxaca

Abstract

This qualitative research identifies and analyzes emotions and interventions linked to affective experiences and cultural aspects of health/illness/care processes in 219 older adults of eight Indigenous groups in Oaxaca, Mexico. Life stories are examined from perspectives of cultural gerontology, anthropology of emotions and critical medical anthropology with a gender perspective. Significance and healing of two illnesses of cultural affiliation: tiricia (sadness of the soul) and envidia (rancor against the successful) are examined. Conditions other than diabetes and hypertension are healed by traditional remedies or spiritual cleansings. Examining tiricia and envidia permit improved knowledge and understanding of the emotional culture and the community.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to give a very special thanks to Hilaria Jarquin Cruz, LE for her personal insights and for the capture and organization of the data. We wish to acknowledge travel support received for presentations of the advances of this work from: The British Council, the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social, the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México Project PAPIIT DGAPA-UNAM IN300817 and the Universidad de la Sierra Sur. This study is a product of “Ama y ora- el único medicamento para la vida”: Representaciones y prácticas de los procesos salud-enfermedad-atención de adultos mayores de Oaxaca [“Love and Prayer – Life's only medicine”: Representations and practices of the health/illness/care processes of older adults of Oaxaca] IISSP/EHPSE/02/2017, Universidad de la Sierra Sur, Instituto de Investigación Sobre la Salud Pública.

Disclosure statement

This research did not receive any grants from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. The authors have no conflicts of interest.

Consent

All the procedures were in accord with the ethical norms in the Mexican General Law of Health in Matters of Health Research and the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975 and its amendments. The identity of the participants will remain anonymous and confidential. All participants gave written consent to the inclusion of material pertaining to themselves. All participants acknowledge that they cannot be identified via the paper and that they have been fully anonymized.