Bridging worlds through decolonial intercultural dialogue

One system of knowledge that coloniality has destituted, appropriated, or rendered invisible is the ancestral healing practices of indigenous communities. In line with the current interest in the field of Intercultural Communication Education and Research, this chapter aims to expand the range of methodologies through which silent voices, cosmogonies, epistemologies, and ontologies can be restored. To this end, we present the outcomes of an intercultural dialogue between the authors. Envisioning intercultural dialogue as a collaborative effort to create a shared tapestry of life that intertwines the living and nonliving, the material and nonmaterial, the authors engage in ‘Palabreos’ (an ancestral onto-epistemological methodology among indigenous communities that consists of ‘weaving the word’ to think, reflect, and construct knowledge), exploring how their ethnic and social backgrounds have shaped their understanding, valuation, and engagement with traditional and ancestral medicine. They also reflect on how the colonial matrix has influenced their attitudes and practical choices between conventional biomedicine and indigenous healing practices.