The Nature, Goal, and Core Business of African Traditional Medicine

An Account for the Southern African Context

Authors

  • Nhlakanipho Hlengwa Centre for Philosophy of Epidemiology, Medicine and Public Health (CPEMPH), Faculty of Humanities, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5165-9196

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/pom.2026.285

Keywords:

Alex Broadbent, Healing thesis, Relational and interconnected thesis, Understanding and explanation thesis, Somogy Varga, African traditional medicine

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that African traditional medicine (ATM), as practiced in a southern African context, involves a relational and interconnected inquiry into conditions of disease, and this investigation is grounded in an African philosophical worldview that integrates human, environmental, and spiritual dimensions (relational and interconnected thesis). Second, its goal is healing, rather than curing, particularly as healing encompasses not only the relief of disease symptoms but also the restoration of a person’s social and spiritual relationships (healing thesis). Finally, its core business is to understand and explain the circumstances and cause(s) of pathological conditions, often through methods such as divination (understanding and explanation thesis).

References

Ashforth, Adam. 2002. “An Epidemic of Witchcraft? The Implications of AIDS for the Post-Apartheid State.” African Studies 61, no. 1: 121–143. https://doi.org/10.1080/00020180220140109.

Behrens, Kevin Gary. 2013. “Two ‘Normative’ Conceptions of Personhood.” Quest: An African Journal of Philosophy / Revue Africaine de Philosophie 25, no. 1–2: 103–119. https://www.academia.edu/6951999/Two_Normative_Conceptions_of_Personhood.

Bird, Alexander. 2019. “Systematicity, Knowledge, and Bias: How Systematicity Made Clinical Medicine a Science.” Synthese 196, no. 3: 863–879. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-017-1342-y.

Bolton, Derek. 2023. “A Revitalized Biopsychosocial Model: Core Theory, Research Paradigms, and Clinical Implications.” Psychological Medicine 53, no. 16: 7504–7511. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0033291723002660.

Boorse, Christopher. 1977. “Health as a Theoretical Concept.” Philosophy of Science 44, no. 4: 542–573. https://doi.org/10.1086/288768.

Broadbent, Alex. 2019. Philosophy of Medicine. Oxford University Press.

Buse, John B., Sonia Caprio, William T. Cefalu, et al. 2009. “How Do We Define Cure of Diabetes?” Diabetes Care 32, no. 11: 2133–2135. https://doi.org/10.2337/dc09-9036.

Cooper, Rachel. 2002. “Disease.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 33, no. 2: 263–282. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0039-3681(02)00018-3.

Ebelebe, Charles A. 2009. Africa and the New Face of Mission: A Critical Assessment of the Legacy of the Irish Spiritans Among the Igbos of Southern Nigeria. University Press of America.

Ekwealo, Chigbo J. 2011. “Environmental Ethics and Values in the 21st Century: An Africanist Philosophical Analysis.” Journal of African Environmental Ethics and Values 1: 1–14.

Fenech, Victor. 2024. “Introduction to Chinese Medicine and Its Holistic Approach.” Victor Fenech Acupuncturist, 26 April. https://victorfenechacupuncturist.com.au/2024/04/26/introduction-to-chinese-medicine/.

Green, Edward C. 1992. “Sexually Transmitted Disease, Ethnomedicine and Health Policy in Africa.” Social Science and Medicine 35, no. 2: 121–130. https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(92)90159-N.

———. 1999. Indigenous Theories of Contagious Disease. Bloomsbury Publishing.

Hoyningen-Huene, Paul. 2013. Systematicity: The Nature of Science. Oxford University Press.

———. 2019. “Replies.” Synthese 196, no. 3: 907–928. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-1741-8.

Masolo, D.A. 2010. Self and Community in a Changing World. Indiana University Press.

Matolino, Bernard. 2014. Personhood in African Philosophy. Cluster Publications.

Molefe, Motsamai. 2020. “Personhood and a Meaningful Life in African Philosophy.” South African Journal of Philosophy 39, no. 2: 194–207. https://doi.org/10.1080/02580136.2020.1774980.

Ncube, Likhwa. 2025. “Rethinking the Nature of Medicine: Limits of the Inquiry Thesis Through the Case of African Traditional Medicine.” Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 46, no. 6: 491–506. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11017-025-09732-3.

———. 2026. “Cure as Medicine’s Constitutive Aim: A Defence of the Refined Curative Thesis.” Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 29: 411–421. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11019-026-10336-4.

Ndlovu, Nokwanda. 2025. “Holistic Conceptions of Healing Among Zulu Traditional Healers of South Africa: A Grounded Inquiry.” PhD diss., Purdue University Graduate School.

Ngubane, Harriet. 1977. Body and Mind in Zulu Medicine: An Ethnography of Health and Disease in Nyuswa-Zulu Thought and Practice. Academic Press.

Ngubane, Ntombifuthi P., and Brenda Z. De Gama. 2024. “The Influence of Culture on the Cause, Diagnosis and Treatment of Serious Mental Illness (Ufufunyana): Perspectives of Traditional Health Practitioners in the Harry Gwala District, KwaZulu-Natal.” Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry 48: 634–654. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11013-024-09863-7.

Okpe, Timothy, and Friday Oti. 2019. “Towards an African Philosophy of Environment.” International Journal of Environmental Pollution and Environmental Modelling 2, no. 3: 105–108. https://izlik.org/JA43KU28PN.

Ozioma, Ezekwesili-Ofili Josephine, and Okaka Antoinette Nwamaka Chinwe. 2019. “Herbal Medicines in African Traditional Medicine.” In Herbal Medicine, edited by Philip F. Builders. IntechOpen. https://doi.org.10.5772/intechopen.80348.

Ramose, Mogobe B. 1999. African Philosophy Through Ubuntu. Mond Books Publishers.

———. 2014. “Ubuntu.” In Degrowth: A Vocabulary for a New Era, edited by Giacomo D'Alisa, Federico Demaria, and Giorgos Kallis, 212–214. Routledge.

Reznek, Lawrie. 2022 (1987). The Nature of Disease. Routledge.

Smart, Benjamin T.H. 2023. “The Core Business of Medicine: A Defence of the Best Available Intervention Thesis.” Synthese 201, no. 6, article 194. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-023-04176-5.

South African History Online. 2011. “Indigenous Medicine and Traditional Healing.” https://sahistory.org.za/article/indigenous-medicine-and-traditional-healing.

Teffo, L.J., and A.P.J. Roux. 2003. “Introduction: Themes in African Metaphysics.” In The African Philosophy Reader, edited by P.H. Coetzee and A.P.J. Roux. 2nd edition. Routledge.

Thornton, Robert J. 2017. Healing the Exposed Being: A South African Ngoma Tradition. Wits University Press.

Tosam, Mbih Jerome. 2021. “Healthcare and Spirituality: A Traditional African Perspective.” Annali di studi religiosi 22: 255–277. https://books.fbk.eu/media/uploads/files/Healthcare_and_Spirituality.pdf.

Tshivhase, Mpho. 2013. “Personhood: Social Approval or a Unique Identity?” Quest: An African Journal of Philosophy / Revue de Philosophie Africaine 25, no. 1–2: 119–140. https://www.quest-journal.net/Quest_25_provisional.pdf.

Ugwu, Bona Ikenna. 2017. “Spirits in African Worldview: Implications for the Church in Africa.” Ministerium: A Journal of Contextual Theology 3, no. 1: 76–88. https://journals.ezenwaohaetorc.org/index.php/Ministerium/article/view/648.

Van der Walt, B.J. 2006. When African and Western Cultures Meet: From Confrontation to Appreciation. Institute for Contemporary Christianity in Africa.

Varga, Somogy. 2024. Science, Medicine, and the Aims of Inquiry: A Philosophical Analysis. Cambridge University Press.

Wakefield, Jerome C. 1992. “The Concept of Mental Disorder: On the Boundary Between Biological Facts and Social Values.” American Psychologist 47, no. 3: 373–388. https://doi.org/10.1037//0003-066x.47.3.373.

White, Peter. 2015. “The Concept of Diseases and Health Care in African Traditional Religion in Ghana.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 71, no. 3: 1–7. https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v71i3.2762.

Wreford, Jo. 2005. Negotiating Relationships Between Biomedicine and Sangoma: Fundamental Misunderstandings, Avoidable Mistakes. CSSR Working Paper No. 138. Centre for Social Science Research (CSSR), University of Cape Town. https://humanities.uct.ac.za/sites/default/files/content_migration/humanities_uct_ac_za/1380/files/wp138.pdf.

Xu, Xin. 2022. “Epistemic Diversity and Cross-Cultural Comparative Research: Ontology, Challenges, and Outcomes.” Globalisation, Societies and Education 20, no. 1: 36–48. https://doi.org/10.1080/14767724.2021.1932438.

Downloads

Published

2026-06-11

How to Cite

Hlengwa, N. (2026). The Nature, Goal, and Core Business of African Traditional Medicine: An Account for the Southern African Context. Philosophy of Medicine, 7(1). https://doi.org/10.5195/pom.2026.285

Issue

Vol. 7 No. 1 (2026)

Section

Original Research Articles (other)

License

Copyright (c) 2026 Nhlakanipho Hlengwa

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. The Author retains copyright in the Work, where the term “Work” shall include all digital objects that may result in subsequent electronic publication or distribution.
  2. Upon acceptance of the Work, the author shall grant to the Publisher the right of first publication of the Work.
  3. The Author shall grant to the Publisher and its agents the nonexclusive perpetual right and license to publish, archive, and make accessible the Work in whole or in part in all forms of media now or hereafter known under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License or its equivalent, which, for the avoidance of doubt, allows others to copy, distribute, and transmit the Work under the following conditions:
    1. Attribution—other users must attribute the Work in the manner specified by the author as indicated on the journal Web site;
    with the understanding that the above condition can be waived with permission from the Author and that where the Work or any of its elements is in the public domain under applicable law, that status is in no way affected by the license.
  4. The Author is able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the nonexclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the Work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), as long as there is provided in the document an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  5. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post online a prepublication manuscript (but not the Publisher’s final formatted PDF version of the Work) in institutional repositories or on their Websites prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work. Any such posting made before acceptance and publication of the Work shall be updated upon publication to include a reference to the Publisher-assigned DOI (Digital Object Identifier) and a link to the online abstract for the final published Work in the Journal.
  6. Upon Publisher’s request, the Author agrees to furnish promptly to Publisher, at the Author’s own expense, written evidence of the permissions, licenses, and consents for use of third-party material included within the Work, except as determined by Publisher to be covered by the principles of Fair Use.
  7. The Author represents and warrants that:
    1. the Work is the Author’s original work;
    2. the Author has not transferred, and will not transfer, exclusive rights in the Work to any third party;
    3. the Work is not pending review or under consideration by another publisher;
    4. the Work has not previously been published;
    5. the Work contains no misrepresentation or infringement of the Work or property of other authors or third parties; and
    6. the Work contains no libel, invasion of privacy, or other unlawful matter.
  8. The Author agrees to indemnify and hold Publisher harmless from Author’s breach of the representations and warranties contained in Paragraph 6 above, as well as any claim or proceeding relating to Publisher’s use and publication of any content contained in the Work, including third-party content.
  9. The Author agrees to digitally sign the Publisher’s final formatted PDF version of the Work.