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Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors
BACKGROUND: In Southwest Ethiopia, various plant species are coexisting in wild and cultivated forms. This provides an ideal setting for studying folk biosystematics of neglected species. One of such species is the Dioscorea species, in which we studied to assess the commonly applied folk wisdom of...
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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BioMed Central
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7777353/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33386077 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13002-020-00427-8 |
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author | Worojie, Tsegaye Babege Asfaw, Bizuayehu Tesfaye Mengesha, Wendawek Abebe |
author_facet | Worojie, Tsegaye Babege Asfaw, Bizuayehu Tesfaye Mengesha, Wendawek Abebe |
author_sort | Worojie, Tsegaye Babege |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: In Southwest Ethiopia, various plant species are coexisting in wild and cultivated forms. This provides an ideal setting for studying folk biosystematics of neglected species. One of such species is the Dioscorea species, in which we studied to assess the commonly applied folk wisdom of identifying, naming, and classifying yams by Sheko and Bench farmers. METHODS: This study was conducted in Bench-Maji and Sheka Zones using 272 farmers. Data on the lists of local names and system of folk taxonomy; the inherent logic, etymons, and consistency of names; and the folk descriptors and other criteria involved in taxonomy were collected. Data were collected by establishing participatory research appraisal tools, i.e., informant interviews and researcher direct observation. RESULTS: The result suggests that there exists a well-developed folk taxonomic system in Sheko and Bench. This is evident in the recognition of four distinct folk ranks: sub-variety, variety, supra-variety, and folk generic. Taxa assigned to each ranks have distinct features that mark them as members of a separate categories. Farmers over-differentiate 58 individual taxa at the intraspecific levels. Of these, 37 represented varietal taxa while the rest are sub-varietal taxa. Structurally, over 78% of the varieties are labeled with unitary names while all the sub-varieties consisted of binomial names. Farmers used a total of 26 characters and 74 character states for identifying the different taxa. More than 84% of these refer to aspects of plant characteristics. Tuber characters played a key role in the local identification of varietal and sub-varietal taxa while contexts and gender played a key role in the recognition of supra-variety groups. CONCLUSIONS: This study documented a great wealth of knowledge on indigenous biosystematics of yams, constitutes an essential step towards setting development priorities aimed at in situ conservation. The study clearly demonstrated the value of folk biosystematics for assessing the actual extent and spatial dynamics of yam diversity in traditional farming. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7777353 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-77773532021-01-04 Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors Worojie, Tsegaye Babege Asfaw, Bizuayehu Tesfaye Mengesha, Wendawek Abebe J Ethnobiol Ethnomed Research BACKGROUND: In Southwest Ethiopia, various plant species are coexisting in wild and cultivated forms. This provides an ideal setting for studying folk biosystematics of neglected species. One of such species is the Dioscorea species, in which we studied to assess the commonly applied folk wisdom of identifying, naming, and classifying yams by Sheko and Bench farmers. METHODS: This study was conducted in Bench-Maji and Sheka Zones using 272 farmers. Data on the lists of local names and system of folk taxonomy; the inherent logic, etymons, and consistency of names; and the folk descriptors and other criteria involved in taxonomy were collected. Data were collected by establishing participatory research appraisal tools, i.e., informant interviews and researcher direct observation. RESULTS: The result suggests that there exists a well-developed folk taxonomic system in Sheko and Bench. This is evident in the recognition of four distinct folk ranks: sub-variety, variety, supra-variety, and folk generic. Taxa assigned to each ranks have distinct features that mark them as members of a separate categories. Farmers over-differentiate 58 individual taxa at the intraspecific levels. Of these, 37 represented varietal taxa while the rest are sub-varietal taxa. Structurally, over 78% of the varieties are labeled with unitary names while all the sub-varieties consisted of binomial names. Farmers used a total of 26 characters and 74 character states for identifying the different taxa. More than 84% of these refer to aspects of plant characteristics. Tuber characters played a key role in the local identification of varietal and sub-varietal taxa while contexts and gender played a key role in the recognition of supra-variety groups. CONCLUSIONS: This study documented a great wealth of knowledge on indigenous biosystematics of yams, constitutes an essential step towards setting development priorities aimed at in situ conservation. The study clearly demonstrated the value of folk biosystematics for assessing the actual extent and spatial dynamics of yam diversity in traditional farming. BioMed Central 2021-01-02 /pmc/articles/PMC7777353/ /pubmed/33386077 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13002-020-00427-8 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
spellingShingle | Research Worojie, Tsegaye Babege Asfaw, Bizuayehu Tesfaye Mengesha, Wendawek Abebe Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title | Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title_full | Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title_fullStr | Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title_full_unstemmed | Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title_short | Indigenous biosystematics of yams (Dioscorea spp.) in Southwest Ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
title_sort | indigenous biosystematics of yams (dioscorea spp.) in southwest ethiopia: folk taxonomy, ethnolinguistic analysis, and folk descriptors |
topic | Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7777353/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33386077 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13002-020-00427-8 |
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