La construcción discursiva de los imaginarios sociales: el caso de la medicina popular chilena

Abstract

This article deals with the representation of the human body (in terms of health and sickness) which underlies the curative practices of popular Chilean “curanderas” and “meicas”. (Research project: FONDECYT 1000376), Through an interdisciplinary approach –linguistic, psychological and sociological– the authors examine the imagery of the human body that is revealed through discoursive practices, and the relationship between the scientific “western” medical representations and those of popular medicine women (mapuche and “hispanic”). The analysis of interviews draws mainly upon the theories of enunciation (Benveniste), intertextuality (Bakhtin) and the actantial analysis of tales (Greimas