Introduction: Comparative Perspectives on the Indigenous Rights Movement in Africa and the Americas

Using ethnographic case studies, these "In Focus" articles explore the indigenous rights movements in two regions, Africa and the Americas, where the histories, agendas, and dynamics of the movements are at once similar and different. They consider a range of relevant questions about the politics of representation, recognition, resources, and rights as these movements engage shifting political and economic landscapes; transnational discourses, alliances, and organizations; and the complicated cultural politics of inclusion and exclusion invoked by the term indigenous. As such, they offer a critical, comparative perspective on the issues of culture, power, representation, and difference inherent in the complicated alliances, articulations, and tensions that have produced and transformed the transnational indigenous rights movement. This introduction provides a brief history of the movement, highlights some major themes in previous anthropological work, reviews the insights of the section articles, and explores some of the ways in which anthropologists have engaged with the movement. [Keywords: indigenous peoples, social movements, cultural politics, ethnography]     

The Same,but Different: Indigenous Knowledge Retention,Erosion, and Innovation in the Brazilian Amazon

This study explores how indigenous knowledge (IK) might be retained and/or changed among contemporary indigenous peoples. Through semi-structured interviews and quantitative analyses of long-term changes in artistic knowledge among three geographically displaced Kaiabi (Kawaiwete) we found an association between language proficiency and gender with greater IK retention, and formal schooling with IK erosion. Six mechanisms of innovation in knowledge of basketry and textiles among men and women were documented. A mixed mode of collaborative learning and knowledge transmission involving diverse actors emerged from community workshops and group forums. Innovative mechanisms for cultural transmission have taken advantage of media, technology, and non-indigenous support organizations to expand weaving knowledge of basketry designs. Our results illustrate how indigenous peoples actively shape cultural transmission and change, as well as the role that public policies and academic research may play in these processes.     

People of India: Biological diversity and affinities

The Indian subcontinent comprises a vast collection of peoples with different morphological, genetic, cultural, and linguistic characteristics. While much of this variability is indigenous, a considerable fraction of it has been introduced through large-scale immigrations into India in historical times. From an evolutionary standpoint, it is of immense interest to quantify biological diversity in contemporary human populations, to study biological affinities and to relate observed patterns of affinities with cultural, linguistic and demographic histories of populations. Such efforts are intended to shed light on the peopling of India. The purpose of this paper is to present a broad overview of the physical (anthropometric) and genetic diversities and affinities of the peoples of India. I shall also attempt to examine how well biological, particularly genetic, diversities and affinities correlate with geographical, socio-cultural, and linguistic diversities and affinities. © 1998 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

How Spaniards Became Chumash and other Tales of Ethnogenesis

In the 1970s, a network of families from Santa Barbara, California, asserted local indigenous identities as "Chumash." However, we demonstrate that these families have quite different social histories than either they or supportive scholars claim. Rather than dismissing these neo-Chumash as anomalous "fakes," we place their claims to Chumash identity within their particular family social histories. We show that cultural identities in these family lines have changed a number of times over the past four centuries. These changes exhibit a range that is often not expected and render the emergence of neo-Chumash more comprehendible. The social history as a whole illustrates the ease and frequency with which cultural identities change and the contexts that foster change. In light of these data, scholars should question their ability to essentialize identity.     

The paradox of primitivism: Native rights and the problem of imagery in cultural survival films

Indigenous peoples are increasingly interested in the making of cultural survival films. This text explores the cinematic borderland where indigenous communities, action anthropologists, and committed filmmakers jointly operate in the production of such native rights documentaries. Considering the role of exotic imagery as an ideological force in the international political arena, the paper identifies and explores the paradox of primitivism. Comparing films to tribal masks, it discusses how indigenous peoples deal with the challenge and opportunity of such imagery. Offering examples of two tribal film projects, with Mi'kmaqs and Apaches, it concludes that exotic imagery, while effective (perhaps even essential) as political agency, may pervert the cultural heritage that indigenous peoples are committed to preserving.     

Language revitalization in Native North America--issues of intellectual property rights and intellectual sovereignty

Language revitalization, oral tradition and epistemology are expressions of Native peoples intellectual sovereignty, and thus the foundation for indigenous intellectual property rights. As the people of California move towards language and cultural revitalization the question arises: What constitutes or constructs the definitions of intellectual property and how can appropriation of indigenous knowledge be protected? Looking at the issues faced by the California's indigenous populace and by implication, other indigenous peoples in the United States, this essay examines how protection may be afforded under the United Nations definition of 'heritage'. Given that the holding safe of a 'culture' or 'heritage' is inclusive of language, and thus has been determined to be a human right.     

"Land, Water, and Truth": San Identity and Global Indigenism

San peoples of southern Africa followed two very different trajectories through the 20th century. For some groups, colonial rule and apartheid meant segregation on geographically remote homelands (or in game parks); for the majority of San, however, they meant incorporation as a landless underclass of farm laborers, domestic servants, and squatters. This bifurcated history now presents obstacles to the recognition of a nascent pan–San identity as the contemporary San join other indigenous peoples in struggles over land rights, control over natural resources, and political voice in national and international arenas. This article discusses some of the ways in which international models of indigenism have colluded with essentialist conceptions of culture and ethnicity to (1) prevent the recognition of the San peoples' cultural identity, as it is shaped by their various historical experiences and socioeconomic conditions, and (2) distort the understanding of San claims for land and natural resources by transforming San struggles for social and economic justice into demands for "cultural preservation." [Keywords: indigenous peoples, San, southern Africa, social movements, cultural politics]     

Social and River Networks for the Trees: Wounaan's Riverine Rhizomic Cosmos and Arboreal Conservation

ABSTRACT   The effects of environmental conservation and development are of significant anthropological interest. Recent focus on the politics of knowledge and translation has shown the importance of cosmology in conservation encounters. I examine how Wounaan indigenous peoples and extralocal conservation practitioners "translate" eastern Panama based on their own cosmologies. ¹ Specifically, I explore how Wounaan's social and river-networked rhizomic cosmos is overlooked in the practice of forest-focused conservation. This results from Panama's environmental history, in which actors simplified early representations of a complex landscape to one characterized by forests, as well as a Western bias toward forests with scant attention paid to cosmology. Finally, I note how Wounaan negotiate this cultural disconnect by emphasizing their ties to forests. In so doing, they buttress the arboreal bias, in turn reinforcing power relations, but also giving themselves political leverage in conservation activities. These results inform recent discussion about politics and scientific praxis in conservation.     

"Kissing a Baby Is Not at All Good for Him": Infant Mortality, Medicine, and Colonial Modernity in the U.S.-Occupied Philippines

Feminist scholars have begun to consider the ways indigenous practices of child rearing were and are challenged in (post)colonial discourse and practice, and how these practices have become a terrain on which definitions of nation, state, and economy are contested. In this article, I adopt a historical anthropological approach to consider how Filipino child-rearing strategies were described and stigmatized in educational, public health, and public welfare discourses in the U.S.-occupied Philippines in the early 20th century. I demonstrate how public health practices and discourses that were generated as part of a "benevolent" campaign against high rates of infant mortality were strategically used as a weapon against Filipino arguments for independence. I also consider how discourses constructing Filipino caregivers as overly indulgent were linked to metropolitan concerns about production of the "new industrial man" and were used to develop a racialized critique of the cultural practices of Filipinos.     

Interpersonal contact and attitudes towards indigenous peoples in Canada's prairie cities

Research finds that non-indigenous peoples often hold negative racial attitudes towards indigenous peoples. Contact theory suggests that interpersonal contact can positively influence majority group members’ attitudes regarding minority group members, raising the question of whether indigenous population growth in cities will alter non-indigenous peoples’ attitudes. Using original 2014 survey data, this paper examines the relationship between interpersonal contact and racial attitudes in Canadian prairie cities. The analysis finds that while personal ties to aboriginal peoples are correlated with lower new and old-fashioned racism scores, general contact with aboriginal peoples only correlates with old-fashioned racism scores. As such, growing urban indigenous populations – and thus increased aboriginal-non-aboriginal general contact – alone should not be expected to result in positive racial attitudes. This research advances understanding of contact theory by considering how education interacts with interpersonal contact, and informs on-going dialogue about current racial relations between non-indigenous and indigenous peoples in Canadian prairie cities.     

Retrieving the Red Continent: settler colonialism and the history of American Indians in the US

While present in the contemporary academy, American Indian history remains marginalized by being associated with regional and national histories of the United States. Recently, postcolonial scholarship has provided a pathway out of that marginalization. The postcolonial critique of traditional anthropological and historical writing about indigenous peoples suggests a new way to imagine the relationship between American Indian history and other areas of scholarship. The most promising aspect of this critique is the formulation of ‘settler colonialism’. That framework first emerged among geographers and has recently been embraced by historians and anthropologists. The settler colonial framework offers a way to conceive of the Native past in a transnational context as well as to understand indigenous encounters with modernity as an ongoing struggle with colonial rule rather than as a campaign to accommodate Native people to ‘progress’ and ‘civilization’ or to ‘assimilate’ them into a nation state.     

Ethnic heterogamy and the risk of partner violence in Mexico

A common stereotype holds that in Mexico male violence toward women is common among indigenous peoples and reflects cultural norms that sanction a male's domination of his female partner. We employ a recent Mexican survey to examine the relative risk of violence against women as a function of the couple's ethnic homogamy. Among couples in which both partners are either non-indigenous or indigenous the female's risk of partner violence is similar. Among heterogamous couples non-indigenous females in relationships in which the male is indigenous are at elevated risk of violence, while indigenous women in relationships with non-indigenous males are at a lower risk of violence. The stresses associated with heterogamy appear to be more salient in determining a woman's risk of violence than ethnicity per se. The implications for future research and the need to deal with the issue of ethnic homogamy in culturally heterogeneous populations are discussed.     

Precarious Alliances: The Cultural Politics and Structural Predicaments of the Indigenous Rights Movement in Tanzania

Since 1990, over one hundred indigenous nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) have emerged in predominantly Maasai areas in Tanzania, attempting to organize people around diverse claims of a common "indigenous" identity based on ethnicity, mode of production, and a long history of political and economic disenfranchisement. Despite attempts to foster unity and promote common political agendas, the indigenous rights movement has been fractured by sometimes quite hostile disagreements over priorities, competition over resources, and tensions over membership and representation. This article explores the complicated causes and consequences of these tensions by focusing on the discussions, disagreements, and silences that occurred during a recent attempt to reconcile indigenous groups in Tanzania. The workshop offers a unique window on the cultural, political, and historical dynamics of the indigenous rights movement in northern Tanzania, the principles and practices of inclusion and exclusion that have defined and shaped the movement, and the internal and external stresses that have made alliances within and among the INGOs, donors, and the government precarious, at best. [Keywords: indigenous peoples, social movements, cultural politics, Maasai, Tanzania]     

From the Ground, Looking Up: Report on the Video nas Aldeias Tour

ABSTRACT  This report compares two recent media events centered on the iconography of Amazonian indigenous peoples to highlight the cultural activism of the collaborative video project, Video nas Aldeias. [Keywords: Amazonia, Video nas Aldeias, indigenous media, cultural activism]     

Shamanism, Christianity and Culture Change in Amazonia

Among many indigenous peoples of Amazonia, shamanism and Christianity co-exist as central cultural elements shaping the ways in which people interpret and interact with the world. Despite centuries of co-existence, the relationship between shamanism and Christianity has entered an especially dynamic era as many of Amazonia’s indigenous peoples abandon Catholicism for Evangelical and Sabbatarian churches. Testing the relationship between Christian church affiliation and shamanism in 23 Makushi and Wapishana communities in southern Guyana, we found that Evangelicals and Sabbatarians are less likely to visit shamans or accept their legitimacy than are Anglicans and Catholics. However, conversion does not necessarily imply a complete rejection of indigenous religious systems as many self-identified Evangelicals and Sabbatarians continue to adhere to some indigenous beliefs and practices. We conclude by positing possible implications of religious conversion for natural resource use on indigenous lands.     

Negotiating with Narrative: Establishing Cultural Identity at the Yukon International Storytelling Festival

Contemporary circumpolar indigenous peoples are experimenting with venues where issues of cultural, economic, and political importance can be translated to broad audiences. This paper examines intercultural transactions occurring at one public festival in northern Canada: the Yukon International Storytelling Festival. Challenging the idea that these performances can be understood as "texts" or "representations" standing outside the daily lives of participants, the author analyzes contemporary public storytelling as a tangible form of social action by performers well attuned to the complexity of their audiences.     

Indigenous Burning as Conservation Practice: Neotropical Savanna Recovery amid Agribusiness Deforestation in Central Brazil

International efforts to address climate change by reducing tropical deforestation increasingly rely on indigenous reserves as conservation units and indigenous peoples as strategic partners. Considered win-win situations where global conservation measures also contribute to cultural preservation, such alliances also frame indigenous peoples in diverse ecological settings with the responsibility to offset global carbon budgets through fire suppression based on the presumed positive value of non-alteration of tropical landscapes. Anthropogenic fire associated with indigenous ceremonial and collective hunting practices in the Neotropical savannas (cerrado) of Central Brazil is routinely represented in public and scientific conservation discourse as a cause of deforestation and increased CO₂ emissions despite a lack of supporting evidence. We evaluate this claim for the Xavante people of Pimentel Barbosa Indigenous Reserve, Brazil. Building upon 23 years of longitudinal interdisciplinary research in the area, we used multi-temporal spatial analyses to compare land cover change under indigenous and agribusiness management over the last four decades (1973–2010) and quantify the contemporary Xavante burning regime contributing to observed patterns based on a four year sample at the end of this sequence (2007–2010). The overall proportion of deforested land remained stable inside the reserve (0.6%) but increased sharply outside (1.5% to 26.0%). Vegetation recovery occurred where reserve boundary adjustments transferred lands previously deforested by agribusiness to indigenous management. Periodic traditional burning by the Xavante had a large spatial distribution but repeated burning in consecutive years was restricted. Our results suggest a need to reassess overreaching conservation narratives about the purported destructiveness of indigenous anthropogenic fire in the cerrado. The real challenge to conservation in the fire-adapted cerrado biome is the long-term sustainability of indigenous lands and other tropical conservation islands increasingly subsumed by agribusiness expansion rather than the localized subsistence practices of indigenous and other traditional peoples.     

Genetic Diversity in the Lesser Antilles and Its Implications for the Settlement of the Caribbean Basin

Historical discourses about the Caribbean often chronicle West African and European influence to the general neglect of indigenous people’s contributions to the contemporary region. Consequently, demographic histories of Caribbean people prior to and after European contact are not well understood. Although archeological evidence suggests that the Lesser Antilles were populated in a series of northward and eastern migratory waves, many questions remain regarding the relationship of the Caribbean migrants to other indigenous people of South and Central America and changes to the demography of indigenous communities post-European contact. To explore these issues, we analyzed mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosome diversity in 12 unrelated individuals from the First Peoples Community in Arima, Trinidad, and 43 unrelated Garifuna individuals residing in St. Vincent. In this community-sanctioned research, we detected maternal indigenous ancestry in 42% of the participants, with the remainder having haplotypes indicative of African and South Asian maternal ancestry. Analysis of Y-chromosome variation revealed paternal indigenous American ancestry indicated by the presence of haplogroup Q-M3 in 28% of the male participants from both communities, with the remainder possessing either African or European haplogroups. This finding is the first report of indigenous American paternal ancestry among indigenous populations in this region of the Caribbean. Overall, this study illustrates the role of the region’s first peoples in shaping the genetic diversity seen in contemporary Caribbean populations.     

Indigenous Struggles and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie1

The position taken in this paper is that the world capitalist system has certain Kafkaesque qualities that are dangerous for all social movements, including indigenous movements. It begins with an analysis of the ‘indigenous’ as a structure of modern national cosmologies as opposed to the real peoples classified into this category. It suggests that the relation between the global system and the construction of this cosmology can account for a great deal of what is happening in the current period of Fourth World struggles. In one sense it appears as if a real liberation from the system is under way for certain of these peoples, and the ideology of the struggle is one of exit, autonomy and self-sufficiency. But liberation from one form of oppression can lead to another integrative process and new forms of class differentiation. Struggles for autonomy may lead to tribal capitalism or dependent class structures for reasons that are not at all obvious, not least to those engaged in the struggle themselves, and they may very well bring better conditions of existence to all involved. In a certain sense, Fourth World movements are an important aspect of the current transformation of the world system and not merely a reaction to it. The changing distribution of motivations that occur in the histories of such movements is the tricky problem, the lure of success and wealth and the fear of failure and marginalisation are motives that are built into the cultural structures of the system as it unfolds historically.