ABSTRACT:
The Kalunga quilombola community preserves traditional care practices, such as the use of medicinal plants, blessings, and midwifery, which challenge the hegemonic biomedical model. For more than four decades, its interaction with universities has generated knowledge in the field of health, questioning colonial frameworks and affirming ancestral knowledge as a foundation of collective health. This study aims to analyze how Kalunga traditional knowledge is addressed in academic production on health, identifying the limits of biomedical bias and proposing pathways for the recognition and valorization of subalternized medical rationalities, grounded in decolonial epistemologies and epistemic justice. This is a qualitative study with a decolonial approach, based on documentary analysis of 140 master’s theses and doctoral dissertations and more than 600 records of grey literature related to the Kalunga community. Artificial intelligence tools were used to organize and conduct thematic analysis of the data, in accordance with ethical and methodological guidelines. The findings indicate a predominance of biomedical and positivist approaches in academic production. However, emergent practices, narratives, and Kalunga knowledge were also identified, challenging this paradigm and recognizing traditional knowledge as legitimate forms of scientific knowledge production. The study contributes to the recognition and valorization of subalternized medical rationalities and to the understanding of situated knowledge as intangible cultural heritage. It highlights pathways for research and public policies that integrate these forms of knowledge into Brazil’s Unified Health System (SUS), particularly through policies on integrative and complementary practices and the health of the Black population, promoting comprehensive, culturally sensitive, and territorially grounded health care.