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Mystic Medicine: Afro-Jamaican Religio-Cultural Epistemology And The Decolonization Of Health, Jake Wumkes

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The underlying motivation for this thesis is the position that colonialism, or coloniality, continues to thrive as an ideological and institutional framework all over the world, to the detriment of the majority of the population of the earth, and particularly of indigenous peoples and the African diaspora. Thus, what is sought here is a decolonization both of mind and institutions. Looking at the case of Jamaica, one can see how coloniality continues to undermine the beliefs, behaviors, institutions, and overall well-being of the majority African-descended population of the island in many ways both culturally and economically. I narrow my focus …