Filbert Minja
Roots of Healing is a project about indigenous herbalists in Tanzania and the knowledge that supports their communities. I was first drawn to this work through my own healing experiences. Over time, it has become a way to explore how land, memory, and plant knowledge shape daily life. I use portraits, quiet observation, and landscape images to show where this knowledge exists.
Rather than presenting herbalism as symbolic or mystical, I photograph it as a real, everyday practice rooted in environment and cultural tradition. I focus on gestures, tools, plant textures, and people’s relationship with the land. Exploring healing as work, inherited knowledge, and cultural continuity.
The project asks what it looks like when knowledge is held in people, plants, and land rather than written records.
My aim is to create images that honour these traditions and offer a nuanced view of indigenous healing.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
A mother holds her child wrapped in medicinal leaves, a simple act of care rooted in indigenous healing knowledge. The moment reflects how plant medicine remains part of daily life, passed between generations through touch, trust, and close relationships with the land.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
Steam from boiled medicinal plants rises as a woman inhales the vapor during a traditional herbal treatment. Plant steam therapy is used to ease illness and restore the body. The moment reflects how healing knowledge is practiced, embodied, and passed through generations.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
A healer leans against the trunk of a medicinal tree, pausing in quiet connection with the land. The moment reflects how healing knowledge is rooted in close relationships with plants, where the forest itself becomes part of care and practice.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Arusha, Tanzania.
A healer chews fresh medicinal stems gathered from the surrounding land, testing their strength and properties. Such practices are part of indigenous herbal knowledge, where taste, touch, and experience guide the understanding of plants and their healing uses.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
Fresh leaves gathered from the surrounding landscape are placed over the eyes as part of a traditional herbal treatment. The practice reflects a close relationship with the environment, where healing emerges from intimate knowledge of plants and the natural world.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Arusha, Tanzania.
A man brings freshly gathered roots close to his face, engaging the senses that guide plant knowledge. Within indigenous healing traditions, smell and touch help identify medicinal plants, reflecting a deep familiarity with the surrounding landscape and its healing resources.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Arusha, Tanzania.
Medicinal plants preserved in water reveal their textures and forms. Such preparations reflect the careful knowledge used to store, study, and apply plant medicine, where healing practices emerge from close observation of nature and long-standing relationships with the land.
Roots of Healing, 2025, Arusha, Tanzania.
A root is extracted from the soil using a digging tool. Gathering medicinal plants requires practical knowledge of the land, including where specific species grow and how they are carefully harvested for traditional healing practices.