Abstract

MAYA, Alfredo Paulo  and  SANCHEZ, Martha Cruz. From what has been called interculturality in health: a reflexive approach. Rev. Univ. Ind. Santander. Salud [online]. 2018, vol.50, n.4, pp.366-384. ISSN 0121-0807.  https://doi.org/10.18273/revsal.v50n4-2018010.

Since the end of the 20th century, broadly speaking, in most Latin American countries, intercultural health has become a government policy that seeks to meet the demands of care and assistance to communities where speakers of indigenous languages reside. As a point of departure, interculturality assumes that ethnic culture is a barrier that prevents access to health services. The proposed strategy includes harnessing an "indigenous" cosmovision in order to design "intercultural" health programs that will effectively implement biomedical techniques in the target population. While discourse regarding "interculturality" circulates in Mexico, Venezuela, and Chile, disparate practices related to so-called intercultural health policies are unfolding within these countries. Thus, the present article identifies similarities and differences in the implementation of such policies. Likewise, it highlights the contradictions of the intercultural approach within the framework of public policies and the socioeconomic conditions faced by indigenous peoples in the three countries.

Keywords : Reflexive anthropology; multi-sited ethnography; health programs; indigenous people; Latin America; intercultural health; training; indicators; socioeconomic conditions.

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