Thesis (M. A. (Anthropology)) -- University of Limpopo, 2016 / The baobab tree (Adansonia digitata), with more than 300 cultural and ethnobotanical uses in Africa has been identified as one of the most important savanna trees to be conserved, domesticated and valorised on the continent. A decline in baobab populations due to overexploitation could have a significant negative effect on African livelihoods. Therefore, it is important to determine potential strategies for the conservation of this tree species. The study aimed to explore the cultural significance and ethnobotanical use, as well as conservation of baobab trees by the Sagole community in the Vhembe District of the Limpopo Province, South Africa. Furthermore, the conservation efforts of this community and the provincial government were also elucidated. In the Sagole community 40 local community members, aged 20 years and older, were selected via convenience sampling. A semi-structured questionnaire was employed to collect information on the cultural significance of baobab trees to members of this community. Research questions focussed specifically on identifying folk taxonomy, the transfer of species-specific information to younger generations, and cultural taboos pertaining to the baobab. It has been discovered that young people of Sagole are not well versed in the cultural value pertaining to baobabs. Furthermore, members of the community and the village head (chief) have limited knowledge related to taboos associated with this species. Thus, when individuals transgressed a taboo related to this tree species there is no formal punishment. Sagole community members use baobab trees for various purposes such as food and medicine. The species is used medically to cure various ailments. Most inhabitants in the community harvest this tree. The most common plant parts harvested for cultural use are the fruits, bark, roots and leaves. However, community members have limited knowledge about the taboos related to harvesting of this majestic tree.

This thesis explores the thematic desire to establish an ecological human bond with nature in four contemporary novels: The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh, An Imaginary Life by David Malouf, and The Expedition to The Baobab Tree by Wilma Stockenström. These authors share a concern with the influence that language has on human perception, and one of the most significant ways they attempt to connect with the natural world is through somehow escaping, or transcending, what they perceive to be the divisive tendencies of language. They all suggest that human perception is not steered entirely by a disembodied mind, which constructs reality through linguistic and cultural lenses, but is equally influenced by physical circumstances and embodied experiences. They explore the potential of corporeal reciprocity and empathy as that which enables understanding across cultural barriers, and a sense of ecologically intertwined kinship with nature. They all struggle to reconcile their awareness of the potential danger of relating to nature exclusively through language, with a desire to speak for the natural world in literature. I have examined whether they succeed in doing so, or whether they contradict their thematic suspicion of language with their literary medium. I have prioritised a close ecocritical reading of the novels and loosely situated the authors’ approach to nature and language within the broad theoretical frameworks of radical ecology, structuralism and poststructuralism. I suggest that these novels are best analysed in the context of an ecocritical mediation between poststructuralist conceptions of nature as inaccessible cultural construct, and the naïve conception of unmediated, pre-reflective interaction with the natural world. I draw especially on the phenomenological theories of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, whose insistence that perception is always both embodied and culturally mediated truly renders culture and nature irreducible, intertwined categories. By challenging historical dualisms like mind/body and culture/nature, the selected novels suggest a more fluid and discursive understanding of the perceived conflict between language and nature, whilst problematizing the perception of language as merely a cultural artefact. Moreover, they are examples of the kind of literature that has the potential to positively influence our human conception of nature, and adapt us better to our ecological context on a planet struggling for survival.