The Pituri Learning Circle: central Australian Aboriginal women's knowledge and practices around the use of Nicotiana spp. as a chewing tobacco

Tobacco smoking has a range of known and predictable adverse outcomes, and across the world sustained smoking reduction campaigns are targeted towards reducing individual and public risk and harm. Conversely, more than 87 million women, mostly in low- and middle-income countries, use smokeless tobacco, yet the research examining the effect of this form of tobacco exposure on women is remarkably scant. In central Australia, the chewing of wild Nicotiana spp., a tobacco plant, commonly known as pituri and mingkulpa, is practised by Aboriginal groups across a broad geographical area. Until recently, there had been no health research conducted on the effects of chewing pituri. This article reports on one component of a multidimensional research agenda. A narrative approach utilising the methodology of the Learning Circle was used to interview three key senior central Australian Aboriginal women representative of three large geographical language groupings. The participants were selected by a regional Aboriginal women's organisation. With the assistance of interpreters, a semistructured interview, and specific trigger resources, participants provided responses to enable an understanding of the women's ethnobotanical knowledge and practices around the use of within the context of Aboriginal women's lives. Data were transcribed, and by using a constant comparison analysis, emergent themes were categorised. The draft findings and manuscript were translated into the participants' language and validated by the participants. Three themes around emerged: (a) the plants, preparation and use; (b) individual health and wellbeing; and (c) family and community connectedness. The findings demonstrated similar participant ethnobotanical knowledge and practices across the geographical area. The participants clearly articulated the ethnopharmacological knowledge associated with mixing with wood ash to facilitate the extraction of nicotine from spp., the results of which were biochemically verified. The participants catalogued the pleasurable and desired effects obtained from use, the miscellaneous uses of , as well as the adverse effects of overdose and toxicity, the catalogue of which matched those of nicotine. The participants' overarching theme was related to the inherent role has in the connectiveness of people to family, friends and community. Central Australian Aboriginal women have a firmly established knowledge and understanding of the pharmacological principles relate