Medicine Women, Curanderas, and Women Doctors [Paperback]

Bobette Perrone (Author), Victoria Krueger (Author), H. Henrietta Stockel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 15, 1993

The stories of ten women healers form the core of this provocative journey into cultural heaing methods utilized by women. In a truly grass-roots project, the authors take the reader along to listen to the voices of Native American medicine women, Southwest Hispanic curanderas, and women physicians as they describe their healing paths.

This book will fascinate anyone interested in the relationship between illness and healing-medical practitioners and historians, patients, anthropologists, feminists, physchologists, psychiatrists, theologians, sociologists, folklorists, and others who seek understanding about our relationship to the forces of both illness and healing.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Bobette Perrone, former Supervisor, Los Angeles County Probation Department, is now a prize-winning fiction and nonfiction author and photographer living in Tucson, Arizona.

Victoria Krueger. Ph. D., and award-winning author, resides in Tucson, Arizona.

H. Henrietta Stockel is cofounder and member of the board of Directors of the Albuquerque Indian Center.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press (March 15, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806125128
• ISBN-13: 978-0806125121
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #236,213 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Information Doesn't Age, January 11, 2008

By 

Gigi (Indiana, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medicine Women, Curanderas, and Women Doctors (Paperback)

So it was published in 1991. The ideas they're writing about were established hundreds of years ago.
This book is written in 4 parts. Part one, medicine women. Part two, cuanderas. Part three, female doctors. Part four, the authors reflections.
In each part they interview three women who practice their healing art.

Informative.

10 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Journey, March 10, 2003

By 

Benjamin G. Gardner (Parkville, MO United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medicine Women, Curanderas, and Women Doctors (Paperback)

Medicine Women, Curanderas, and Women Doctors makes for an interesting, enlightening read. It relates the personal philosophies of a handful of women-Native American Medicine Women, Hispanic curanderas, and female MD's-and delves into their motivations while examining their impact on the world around them. At the same time, it traces the journey-some might call it a spiritual quest-which the authors follow to ultimate, fulfilling enlightenment regarding the place of women in all aspects of life. A monument to the strength of women the world over, the authors have compiled an argument in favor of traditional and holistic medical science and the woman's place within that science.

However, in examining various points of view, the authors repeatedly commit several faults. One of them is continuous criticism of Christianity and the Anglo-European way of life in contrast to the sometimes pantheistic and often superstitious viewpoints held by folk healers. I believe that undeserved judgment is leveled on the American culture as a whole, when such judgment might be better and more fairly reserved for its abuses.

Another fault is that in presenting a wide assortment of individuals who believe strongly in differing aspects of healing, the focus of the book becomes too diffused and generalized to maintain truly profound significance. In detailing the beliefs of the pantheistic Indians, the fervently monotheistic Hispanics, and the skeptically religious women doctors of today, and by mustering these viewpoints against the errors and abuses of anti-traditionalism without allowing them to dialogue among themselves, the authors leave the reader with a sense of ideological dissonance and irrelevance.

However, on the positive side, the reader does come away with an appreciation for the strength and determination of women the world over in providing comfort and healing. Too, the obvious link between an individual's mental/psychological state and his physical well being cannot and should not be ignored. These two insights, as well as a clear look at the context and history of all the influences that have been brought to bear on the healing process, are very valuable. This book is not only an interesting journey, it is a very insightful, educational one, as well.

- Benjamin Gene Gardner