1,721,021 research outputs found
The imbalance of power: Leadership, masculinity and wealth in the Amazon
No full textAmerindian societies have an iconic status in classical political thought. For Montaigne, Hobbes, Locke, Hume and Rousseau, the native American ‘state of nature’ operates as a foil for the European polity. Challenging this tradition, The Imbalance of Power demonstrates ethnographically that the Carib speaking indigenous societies of the Guiana region of Amazonia do not fit conventional characterizations of ‘simple” political units with ‘egalitarian’ political ideologies and ‘harmonious’ relationships with nature. Marc Brightman builds a persuasive and original theory of Amerindian politics: far from balanced and egalitarian, Carib societies are rife with tension and difference; but this imbalance conditions social dynamism and a distinctive mode of cohesion. The Imbalance of Power is based on the author’s fieldwork in partnership with Vanessa Grotti, who is working on a companion volume entitled Living with the Enemy: First Contacts and the Making of Christian Bodies in Amazonia
Water Management in Sites of Abundance: Ecosystem Policy and Native Peoples in the Guianas
No full textStudies of the social relations connected to water are most commonly associated with places in which water is a scarce and valued commodity, and in which the management of water use is an important practical question on a local level. However, in the context of widespread concern about global climate change, discourses have emerged about the problems of global management of water resources, and these are beginning to have an influence even in places where water is abundant. For the Guiana Caribs, the aquatic environment of the great rivers of the Amazon rainforest plays a fundamental economic role, most directly as a source of drinking water and fish, a place to wash, and a medium for transpor-tation. It is also, perhaps unsurprisingly, prominent in their cosmology and ancestral myths
Esperança e compatibilidade equívoca na governança da floresta: redd+ e os direitos sobre as terras indígenas e tribais no Suriname
No full textREDD+ é um programa ambicioso para uma arquitetura global da governança da floresta. Os preparativos técnicos para seu estabelecimento estão em andamento em diversos países. No Suriname, os riscos e benefícios referentes ao REDD+ diferem de acordo com as perspectivas de distintos atores. A possibilidade do REDD+ trouxe urgência para uma luta política corrente sobre os direitos a terra de povos indígenas e tribais. Ainda assim, enquanto as negociações sobre direitos territoriais ficam paralisadas, os benefícios referentes aos financiamentos e competências técnicas são capturados pelas elites e ONGs internacionais. Este artigo trata da ecologia política do REDD+ no Suriname e sugere que os resultados de suas políticas, para o bem ou para o mal, não serão aqueles referentes às suas intenções originais.REDD+ is an ambitious programme for a global architecture for forest governance, and technical preparations for its institution are underway in a number of countries. In Suriname the risks and benefits presented by REDD+ appear differently from the perspectives of different actors. The prospect of REDD+ added urgency to an ongoing political struggle over land rights for indigenous and tribal peoples. But while land rights negotiations stall, the benefits of funding and technical capacity building are captured by elites and international NGOs. This article explores the political ecology of REDD+ in Suriname and suggests that the outcomes of REDD+ policy, for good or ill, will not be those for which it is designed
Audit sauvage: régimes de valeur de la terre et de la biodiversité en Amazonie
No full textThe efforts of international environmental NGOs to preserve biodiversity are increasingly embedded in a globalising worldview connected to sophisticated techniques for the quantification and surveillance of forest carbon and biodiversity. The ethnographic study of conservation must consequently take into account the new political, economic and ideological context represented by the liberalisation of conservation. In this article, I compare the points of view of, on the one hand, scientific and governmental actors, and on the other hand, the Trio, a Carib people of Suriname, on the forest, land and territory, in order to evaluate the possibility of collaborating for the protection of biodiversity, and I raise questions about the definition of biodiversity itself.Aujourd’hui, les efforts des ONGs environnementales internationales pour préserver la biodiversité s’insèrent toujours plus dans une perspective globalisante liée à des techniques sophistiquées de quantification et de surveillance du carbone et de la biodiversité des forêts. L’étude ethnographique de la conservation doit désormais prendre en compte le nouveau contexte politique, économique et idéologique que représente la « libéralisation » de la conservation. Dans cet article, je compare le point de vue sur la forêt, la terre et le territoire des acteurs scientifiques et gouvernementaux d’une part, et celui des Tirio, peuple Caribe du Suriname d’autre part, afin d’évaluer les possibilités de collaborations inter-culturelles pour la protection de la biodiversité, tout en proposant une réflexion sur des questions plus fondamentales autour de la définition même de ce concept
Strategic ethnicity on the global stage: identity and property in the global indigenous peoples’ movement, from the central Guianas to the United Nations
No full textBased on fieldwork in Suriname, French Guiana and Geneva, this paper considers the implications of the discrep- ancy between contrasting representations of indigenous identity: the global Indigenous Peoples’ movement and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples present indigenous peoples as descent-based groups; meanwhile Guianese Amerindians have a proces- sual relationship with the environment, and use their rela- tionships with the exterior to renew society. The differences between forms of identity in local and global contexts can thus be regarded as representing the dynamism and trans- formability of identity itself
Maps and clocks in Amazonia: The things of conversion and conservation
No full textEngaging with the recent interest in materiality in the anthropology of Amazonia, this article focuses on objects which might seem to present a challenge to indigenous systems of thought. Maps and clocks separate and abstract space and time from each other, and from the phenomena of experience, by reducing them to plane and number. Partly for this reason, and partly because of their association with Christian conversion, they may be seen as symbols and instruments of colonialism and of the technological foundations of European power. The article offers an analysis of an Amazonian group's strong interest in these objects and in the modes of thought which they represent. It concludes with reflections on native historicity and the modalities of cultural change in a context of sustained contact with alterity. © Royal Anthropological Institute 2012
Creativity and Control: Property in Guianese Amazonia
No full textCreativity and Control: Property in Guianese Amazonia. This article introduces the anthropology of property relations to indigenous Amazonia, where property has long been assumed to be absent, and shows that focusing on Amazonian forms of property can lead to greater understanding of native practices and institutions. The article begins by showing that the Trio, Wayana and Akuriyo of southern Suriname have a wide range of practices and values which can usefully be understood in terms of property. This provides the basis for a discussion of the analytical importance of the anthropology of property for Amazonia, followed by a consideration of the place of Amazonian forms of property in the context of anthropological theory.Créativité et contrôle: la propriété en Amazonie guyanaise. Cet article traite de l’anthropologie des relations de propriété en Amazonie indigène. Alors que, dans cette région, le concept de « propriété » a été longtemps considéré comme absent, nous démontrons ici qu’en s’interrogeant sur les formes amazoniennes de propriété, il est possible d’atteindre une meilleure compréhension des pratiques et des institutions indigènes. On s’attachera, tout d’abord, à montrer que les Trio, les Wayana et les Akuriyo du sud du Suriname possèdent une large palette de pratiques et de valeurs qui peuvent être comprises en termes de propriété. C’est sur cette base que l’on peut entamer une discussion sur l’importance analytique de l’anthropologie de la propriété pour l’Amazonie et repenser la place que les formes amazoniennes de propriété prennent dans le contexte des théories anthropologiques.Creatividad y control: la propiedad en la Amazonía guayanesa. Este artículo trata de la antropología de las relaciones de propiedad en la Amazonía indígena, región donde la propiedad ha sido desde hace mucho tiempo presentada como ausente. Demostramos aquí que las formas de propiedad existentes en la Amazonía permiten una mayor comprensión de las prácticas e instituciones indígenas. Empezamos demostrando que los tirios, los wayanas y los akuriyos del sur de Surinam poseen una gran variedad de prácticas y valores que pueden ser considerados en términos de propiedad. Esta parte descriptiva permite que se discuta la importancia analítica de la antropología de la propiedad en el estudio de esta región y nos lleva a concebir el lugar de las formas amazónicas de propiedad en el contexto de la teoría antropológica
Acosta, Raúl. Civil becomings: performative politics in the Amazon and the Mediterranean. 224 pp., illus, bibliogr. Tuscaloosa: Univ. of Alabama Press, 2020. £47.50 (cloth)
No full textCivil becomings is an ethnographic study of advocacy networks based on field research with a ‘socioenvironmental’ NGO in Brazil in 2004, and with the Mediterranean Social Forum in Barcelona in 2005. Despite the book's long germination before its publication in 2020, it succeeds in remaining relevant today: while readers familiar with the social worlds with which it is directly concerned will recognize how much has changed, and despite the notable absence of digital media as the primary mode of communication in the advocacy world, Acosta's theoretical framing and analysis contribute to ongoing interdisciplinary conversations about political action and the role of civil society
Nicholas C. Kawa, Amazonia in the Anthropocene: People, Soils, Plants, Forests (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2016), pp. xiii+ 186,£ 17.99, pb
No full textNicholas C. Kawa, Amazonia in the Anthropocene: People, Soils, Plants, Forests (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2016), pp. xiii+ 186,£ 17.99, p
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