The Scientific Institutionalization of Indigenous Knowledge in Mexico: A Historical Analysis of the Medical and Surgical Academy of Puebla de los Ángeles

Susana Carolina  Guzmán-Rosas

doi:10.4236/jss.2015.37041

Susana Carolina Guzmán-Rosas^*

Abstract: This paper presents a historical analysis on the Medical and Surgical Academy of Puebla de los ángeles, which was founded in Mexico in 1824. The methodology of the science history was used, particularly the historiography. The above mentioned Academy can be considered the first institution that in the Independent period of Mexico approached scientifically the indigenous knowledge on medicinal plants, across the disciplines as the botany, the chemistry and the medicine. In this academy the first two Mexican scientific works in the analyzed topic were published; the first one was a book on botany and the second one was a proposal for a Mexican pharmacopoeia. Furthermore there was a particular way of hierarchy relation between the characters of the indigenous knowledge and the characters of the scientific knowledge, which would become stronger in the approaches of the epochs and future institutions later to the academy’s life. Nevertheless, this institution was buried in the science history, due to her rivalries with another scientific institution that obtained greater diffusion in the topic and denied the credit to the contributions and the existence of the Academy of Puebla de los ángeles.

Keywords: Scientific Institutionalization, Indigenous Knowledge, Botanical Charts, Mexican Pharmacopoeia, Academia Médico Quirúrgica de Puebla de los Ángeles

Cite this paper: Guzmán-Rosas, S. (2015) The Scientific Institutionalization of Indigenous Knowledge in Mexico: A Historical Analysis of the Medical and Surgical Academy of Puebla de los Ángeles. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 3, 283-292. doi: 10.4236/jss.2015.37041.

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