Korkut Ata Türkiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi

Abstract

Folk medicine is a conceptual framework that expresses the knowledge and experiences that are passed down from generation to generation to treat the ailments that people are exposed to. Within this framework, although the process of treating diseases has priority, practices based on preventing diseases, in other words, preventing diseases, can also find a place for themselves. This situation has brought along a perspective that proposes to evaluate the knowledge and practices of folk medicine within the scope of preventive health services, one of today's health-related approaches. According to this perspective, which is called protective/preventive folk medicine, the knowledge and practices of folk medicine should be handled in two groups: for treating diseases and for protecting against diseases. The primary issue in protective/preventive public medicine, which includes knowledge and practices that have the quality of preventing diseases, is the protection of health and the elimination of conditions that may predispose to diseases. This article is an attempt to evaluate the knowledge and practices aiming to protect people from diseases through the aspects reflected in proverbs from oral culture products. Proverbs, in which the knowledge and experiences acquired by people are expressed in stereotyped expressions, are words that undertake important functions in the transmission of culture. Information about folk medicine is also found in the proverbs that enable the transfer of the experiences of the ancestors to their descendants. In this study, which approaches proverbs in the context of protective/preventive folk medicine, proverbs that are appropriate to be evaluated within the scope of protective/preventive folk medicine are examined under three headings: eating habits, place preferences and behavioural patterns.