Etiology, Hunger, and Folk Diseases in the Venezuelan Andes

The object of this paper is to develop etiological categories and explain the curative treatments of folk diseases in the municipality of El Morro in the Venezuelan Andes. The empirical data were compiled through questionnaires and extended interviews with selected informants. The Morreros' medical system is a synthesis of indigenous and Spanish beliefs transmitted and transformed over a period of four centuries; but in addition a new concept--hunger--was incorporated. An explanation of ultimate causation, hunger appears as a conceptual innovation superimposed on the legacy of indigenous and Spanish beliefs.