Internal and External Factors Affecting Loss of Traditional Knowledge: Evidence from a Horticultural Society in South India

摘要

This article analyzes how the factors internal to a particular society may interact with external factors to affect traditional ecological knowledge. I use a horticultural society, the Konda Reddis of Andhra Pradesh, India, as a case study. The paper explains how they have shifted from swidden agriculture to cash-cropping of cashew because of both internal (localized) and external factors, and it explores the impact of this shift on the forest environment. The internal factors include socioeconomic and environmental conditions, which have increased the pressure on forestlands and in turn led to changes in the forest vegetation, and the ex-ternal factors include intervention from outside the local economy and society. Since the interplay of internal and external factors is affecting traditional cultivation and the forest resources and subsequently eroding or changing the knowledge related to those spheres, this article posits that both internal and external factors are important for addressing the issue of change in traditional ecological knowledge. In fact, the interplay of various factors at multiple levels is more important since such interaction can actually affect the knowledge. Thus, the study adds a new dimension (of internal factors and their interactions with external factors) to the ongoing discourse on the loss of traditional ecological knowledge.