A Cree Healer and His Medicine Bundle: Revelations of Indigenous Wisdom--Healing Plants, Practices, and Stories
240A Cree Healer and His Medicine Bundle: Revelations of Indigenous Wisdom--Healing Plants, Practices, and Stories
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Overview
With Young and Rogers, Willier offers his practices here for future generations. At once a study and a guide, A Cree Healer and His Medicine Bundle touches on how indigenous healing practices can be used to complement mainstream medicine, improve the treatment of chronic diseases, and lower the cost of healthcare. The authors discuss how mining, agriculture, and forestry are threatening the continued existence of valuable wild medicinal plants and the role of alternative healers in a modern health care system. Sure to be of interest to ethnobotanists, medicine hunters, naturopaths, complementary and alternative health practitioners, ethnologists, anthropologists, and academics, this book will also find an audience with those interested in indigenous cultures and traditions.
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9781583949030 |
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Publisher: | North Atlantic Books |
Publication date: | 06/09/2015 |
Pages: | 240 |
Product dimensions: | 6.50(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.50(d) |
About the Author
ROBERT DALE ROGERS, BSc, RH/AHG, FICN, has been a student of native plants and fungi from the Canadian prairies for more than forty years. He is a retired clinical herbalist, amateur mycologist, and professional member of the American Herbalist Guild. Rogers is an assistant clinical professor in family medicine at the University of Alberta. His over 20 books and ebooks may be found at www.amazon.com/author/robertdalerogers. They involve the traditional use of plants and fungi of the boreal forest with special attention to application by aboriginal healers. Rogers teaches plant medicine at Grant MacEwan University and the Northern Star College of Mystical Studies in Edmonton (www.northernstarcollege.com). He is a consultant to the herbal, mycological, and nutraceutical industries, is currently chair of the medicinal mushroom committee of the North American Mycological Association, and is on the editorial board of the International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms. Rogers lives in Edmonton, Canada with his wife, Laurie. You can visit their webpage at www.selfhealdistributing.com.
RUSSELL WILLIER was born on the Sucker Creek Reserve in northern Alberta. He grew up in a large family of twelve brothers and sisters. His father was a skilled hunter and trapper who passed his knowledge about the traditional Woods Cree way of life on to his son. Willier attended Catholic mission school but quit in order to help his parents on the family farm. Even at an early age, Russell showed signs of having been selected by the Spirit World to be a healer, but he resisted for many years. Eventually, he accepted this responsibility and received the medicine bundle of his great grandfather, Moostoos, a well-known healer in the area and signer of Treaty 8. By the time Willier received his medicine bundle, the knowledge of how to use the little plant packets inside it had been lost, so Russell showed them to elders and asked if they knew how these “combinations” were used. Gradually, over many years, Russell pieced together the information he needed to begin practice as a Medicine Man. Willier, who still lives on the Sucker Creek Reserve, travels extensively to treat those who call upon him for help.
Table of Contents
Preface
Part I Russell Willier, Cree Healer 1
Chapter 1 Willier's Life as a Healer 3
Becoming a Medicine Man 3
Approaching a Healer 5
My Cosmology 6
Native Medicine 8
Collecting Plants 10
Common Problems Treated 11
Survival of Native Medicine 12
Working with Non-Native Doctors 14
The Future 14
Chapter 2 Ecological Issues Important to Willier 17
Clearcut 17
Fish 18
Ducks 19
Moose and Deer 19
Plants 19
Fires 20
Chapter 3 Willier's Favorite Healing Stories 23
Near-Death Experiences of Patients 23
Predicaments in Which Healers Can Find Themselves 29
Part II Russell Willier's Medicine Bundle 37
Chapter 4 Field Trip, Summer 2011 39
Chapter 5 Plants Used by Russell Willier 57
Plants in Willier's Medicine Bundle 57
Cleaning and Storing 161
Part III The Efficacy of Native Medicine 163
Teenagers Treated at the Reserve 166
Personal Experience 167
The Mouse Woman of Gabriola 168
Deborah Gray 168
How Do We Explain Such Results? 168
Conclusion 173
Appendix A Maps of Areas Where Willier Collects His Herbs 175
Appendix B Index of Common English Names for the Plants Used by Willier 201
Appendix C Index of Cree Names for the Plants Used by Willier 203
Appendix D Index of English Names Used by Willier for the Plants He Uses 205
References 207
Index 217
About the Authors 221