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Around the year 1800, independent Native groups still effectively controlled about half the territory of the Americas. How did they maintain their political autonomy and territorial sovereignty, hundreds of years after the arrival of Europeans? In a study that spans the eighteenth to twentieth centuries and ranges across the vast interior of South America, Heather F. Roller examines this history of power and persistence from the vantage point of autonomous Native peoples in Brazil. The central argument of the book is that Indigenous groups took the initiative in their contacts with Brazilian society. Rather than fleeing or evading contact, Native peoples actively sought to appropriate what w...
There are currently several debates taking place simultaneously in various fields of psychology which address the same fundamental issue: to what extent are the processes and resources that underlie higher cognition domain-general versus domain-specific? Extreme Domain Specificity argues that people are effective thinkers only in contexts which they have directly experienced, or in which evolution has equipped them with effective solutions. The role of general cognitive abilities is ignored, or denied altogether. This book evaluates the evidence and arguments put forward in support of domain specific cognition, at the expense of domain generality. The contributions reflect a range of experti...
While the strength of contemporary Latin American cinema is recognized worldwide, less is known of the cinema of Indigenous communities in the region, a territorial expanse known as Abya Yala. Even so, and even as these Indigenous filmmakers face ongoing challenges--including persecution, state violence, and a lack of infrastructure or funding--they have still managed to flourish over the past four decades, using cinema as a powerful tool for promoting advocacy and fostering self-determination. How do these filmmakers disrupt foundational narratives about their communities, and how does their cinema articulate Indigenous knowledges or provoke a rethinking of society, history, and planetary w...
Anthropology is more relevant than ever before to making sense of the constant intercultural encounters taking place around the world. Even though the discipline was born out of the need to understand the way humans interact, it had for decades been trapped in a counter-cultural stance that effectively disarmed it of any direct influence on public affairs. Recent global trends, however, have brought this academic discipline to the attention of governments, agencies, and social entrepreneurs, because of its capacity to create bridges of understanding between people of contrasting cultures. This ability is today more necessary than ever before in facing the challenges posed by the shrinking of our world. This volume provides reflections on what anthropological research can offer through its “thick” analyses. We are convinced that ethnographic research can contribute to a better understanding of social phenomena in our global times.
Scholars in International Development, Anthropology (Social Anthropology and Medical Anthropology), Political Science, Women’s and Gender Studies and Global Health Studies.
The discovery of the New World offered European civilisation the chance to generate a process of circulation of its own cultural values – the “spiritual conquest” – that has no comparable precedents. The missionary orders played an important role during this “Westernisation of the world,” not only as key players in the spread of Christian values, but also as mediators between different worlds. Indeed, missionary practices imposed the dominating culture’s values and institutions on the vanquished peoples. At the same time, they also promoted the circulation of new knowledge and the negotiation between different cultures during the age of a global integration of space. This book ...
Transforming Indigeneity is an examination of the role that language revitalization efforts play in cultural politics in the small city of S?o Gabriel da Cachoeira, located in the Brazilian Amazon. Sarah Shulist concentrates on how debates, discussions, and practices aimed at providing support for the Indigenous languages of the region shed light on both global issues of language revitalization and on the meaning of Indigeneity in contemporary Brazil. With 19 Indigenous languages still spoken today, S?o Gabriel is characterized by a high proportion of Indigenous people and an extraordinary amount of linguistic diversity. Shulist investigates what it means to be Indigenous in this setting of urbanization, multilingualism, and state intervention, and how that relates to the use and transmission of Indigenous languages. Drawing on perspectives from Indigenous and non-Indigenous political leaders, educators, students, and state agents, and by examining the experiences of urban populations, Transforming Indigeneity provides insight on the revitalization of Amazonian Indigenous languages amidst large social change.
Critical Medical Anthropology presents inspiring work from scholars doing and engaging with ethnographic research in or from Latin America, addressing themes that are central to contemporary Critical Medical Anthropology (CMA). This includes issues of inequality, embodiment of history, indigeneity, non-communicable diseases, gendered violence, migration, substance abuse, reproductive politics and judicialisation, as these relate to health. The collection of ethnographically informed research, including original theoretical contributions, reconsiders the broader relevance of CMA perspectives for addressing current global healthcare challenges from and of Latin America. It includes work spanning four countries in Latin America (Mexico, Brazil, Guatemala and Peru) as well as the trans-migratory contexts they connect and are defined by. By drawing on diverse social practices, it addresses challenges of central relevance to medical anthropology and global health, including reproduction and maternal health, sex work, rare and chronic diseases, the pharmaceutical industry and questions of agency, political economy, identity, ethnicity, and human rights.
Mysteries of the Jaguar Shamans of the Northwest Amazon tells the life story of Mandu da Silva, the last living jaguar shaman among the Baniwa people in the northwest Amazon. In this original and engaging work, Robin M. Wright, who has known and worked with da Silva for more than thirty years, weaves the story of da Silva’s life together with the Baniwas’ society, history, mythology, cosmology, and jaguar shaman traditions. The jaguar shamans are key players in what Wright calls “a nexus of religious power and knowledge” in which healers, sorcerers, priestly chanters, and dance-leaders exercise complementary functions that link living specialists with the deities and great spirits of...
The age of digital culture has not only brought significant transformations in how we perceive memory, history, and heritage, but it has also raised pressing questions about authenticity and ownership of memory. The role of digital technologies in shaping collective identities is a topic of intense scrutiny. Moreover, contemporary societies grapple with complex issues in the politics of memory, especially with the proliferation of diverse narratives and the manipulation of public spaces. The book's content is therefore highly relevant, offering critical reflection and scholarly analysis to these societal challenges. Performativity and the Representation of Memory: Resignification, Appropriat...