Cultural Influences on the Use of Biomedical Reproductive Healthcare in the Andean Highlands

Abstract

This thesis demonstrates some of the many ways that indigenous women in the Andean highlands are influenced to utilize indigenous medical and biomedical reproductive healthcare services and contraceptive methods. It focuses on some of the deeply rooted influences that affect choice of care, in particular, the cultural construction of the female body, gender roles and authority, the theories and practices of biomedicine in relation to those of indigenous Andean medicine, and the historical exploitation of indigenous Andean groups.