The denied land rights of the indigenous peoples and their endangered livelihood and survival: the case of the Nuba of the Sudan

The current situation of indigenous peoples in the Sudan is the result of the independent state's adoption of land and other policies identical to those introduced by colonialists more than a century ago. The Sudanese state has not only unwittingly maintained some colonial coercive institutions and policies but it has introduced more aggressive ones and brutally deployed them against its indigenous peoples, particularly the Nuba. In the light of this, this paper attempts to demonstrate analytically how some historical and contemporary socio-political dynamics have continued systematically to deprive these indigenous Nuba peoples of their customary land, and to assess to what extent the recently concluded Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) has been successful in addressing the land question as one of the root causes of the recurring civil wars in the Sudan in general and in the Nuba Mountains in particular.     

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.     

Phylogeography of Camassia quamash in western North America: postglacial colonization and transport by indigenous peoples

Recent human activities have spread numerous plant species across the globe, yet it is unclear to what degree historical human activities influenced plant dispersal. In western North America, Camassia quamash was one of the most important food plants for indigenous peoples, who transported its propagules either intentionally or accidentally. We investigated how human and natural dispersal might have contributed to the current pattern of spatial genetic structure in C. quamash by performing phylogeographical surveys at two geographical scales. We sequenced two noncoding regions of chloroplast deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) in 226 individuals from 53 populations of C. quamash as well as 126 individuals from 21 populations of the non-food plant Zigadenus venenosus . Contrary to the expectation of anthropogenic transport, C. quamash populations did not exhibit weaker genetic structure than Z. venenosus populations. We also failed to find convincing evidence for signatures of transport. Instead, our data showed strong effects of past glaciation and geographical barriers of the mountains in the Cascade Range, Olympic Peninsula and Vancouver Island. West of the Cascades, the species appears to have largely migrated northward from a southern refugium after deglaciation, whereas few populations having a highly divergent haplotype might have survived in southwestern Washington. Our data suggest that despite substantial ethnobotanical evidence for anthropogenic transport, the current pattern of genetic structure of C. quamash does not show any detectable signatures of transport by indigenous peoples and is better understood as the result of natural dispersal processes.     

A view from the forest floor: the impact of logging on indigenous peoples in Brazil

The social impact of the mahogany trade on the indigenous peoples of Brazil is described. Emphasis is placed on the violence directed against Indians and the consequences of the destruction of their environment which results from the trade. Also mentioned are the judicial issues regarding the illegal extraction of mahogany from protected areas and several of the court cases against logging companies. A moratorium on mahogany logging in Brazil is advocated as is the right of indigenous peoples to control their lands and resources as the way to conserve their environment.     

Oil and gas projects in the Western Amazon: threats to wilderness, biodiversity, and indigenous peoples

Background

The western Amazon is the most biologically rich part of the Amazon basin and is home to a great diversity of indigenous ethnic groups, including some of the world''s last uncontacted peoples living in voluntary isolation. Unlike the eastern Brazilian Amazon, it is still a largely intact ecosystem. Underlying this landscape are large reserves of oil and gas, many yet untapped. The growing global demand is leading to unprecedented exploration and development in the region.

Methodology/Principal Findings

We synthesized information from government sources to quantify the status of oil development in the western Amazon. National governments delimit specific geographic areas or “blocks” that are zoned for hydrocarbon activities, which they may lease to state and multinational energy companies for exploration and production. About 180 oil and gas blocks now cover ∼688,000 km² of the western Amazon. These blocks overlap the most species-rich part of the Amazon. We also found that many of the blocks overlap indigenous territories, both titled lands and areas utilized by peoples in voluntary isolation. In Ecuador and Peru, oil and gas blocks now cover more than two-thirds of the Amazon. In Bolivia and western Brazil, major exploration activities are set to increase rapidly.

Conclusions/Significance

Without improved policies, the increasing scope and magnitude of planned extraction means that environmental and social impacts are likely to intensify. We review the most pressing oil- and gas-related conservation policy issues confronting the region. These include the need for regional Strategic Environmental Impact Assessments and the adoption of roadless extraction techniques. We also consider the conflicts where the blocks overlap indigenous peoples'' territories.     

A predominantly indigenous paternal heritage for the Austronesian-speaking peoples of insular Southeast Asia and Oceania

Modern humans reached Southeast Asia and Oceania in one of the first dispersals out of Africa. The resulting temporal overlap of modern and archaic humans-and the apparent morphological continuity between them-has led to claims of gene flow between Homo sapiens and H. erectus. Much more recently, an agricultural technology from mainland Asia spread into the region, possibly in association with Austronesian languages. Using detailed genealogical study of Y chromosome variation, we show that the majority of current Austronesian speakers trace their paternal heritage to Pleistocene settlers in the region, as opposed to more-recent agricultural immigrants. A fraction of the paternal heritage, however, appears to be associated with more-recent immigrants from northern populations. We also show that the northern Neolithic component is very unevenly dispersed through the region, with a higher contribution in Southeast Asia and a nearly complete absence in Melanesia. Contrary to claims of gene flow (under regional continuity) between H. erectus and H. sapiens, we found no ancestral Y chromosome lineages in a set of 1,209 samples. The finding excludes the possibility that early hominids contributed significantly to the paternal heritage of the region.     

Genetic characterization of indigenous peoples from Oaxaca, Mexico, and its relation to linguistic and geographic isolation

We used 15 short tandem repeat (STR) loci (D8S1179, D21S11, D7S820, CSF1PO, D3S1358, TH01, D13S317, D16S539, D2S1338, D19S433, VWA, TPOX, D18S51, D5S818, and FGA) to genetically characterize 361 individuals from 11 indigenous populations (Amuzgo, Chinanteco, Chontal, Huave, Mazateco, Mixe, Mixteco, Triqui, Zapoteco del Istmo, Zapoteco del Valle, and Zoque) from Oaxaca, Mexico. We also used previously published data from other Mexican peoples (Maya, Chol, Tepehua, Otomí, and Mestizos from northern and central Mexico) to delineate genetic relations, for a total of 541 individuals. Average heterozygosity (H) was lower in most populations from Oaxaca (range 0.687 in Zoque to 0.756 in Chontal) than values observed in Mestizo populations from Mexico (0.758 and 0.793 in central and northern Mestizo, respectively) but higher than values observed in other Amerindian populations from South America; the same relation was true for the number of alleles (n(a) ). We tested (using the software Structure) whether major geographic or linguistic barriers to gene flow existed among the populations of Oaxaca and found that the populations appeared to constitute one or two genetic groups, suggesting that neither geographic location nor linguistics had an effect on the genetic structure of these culturally and linguistically highly diverse indigenous peoples. Moreover, we found a low but statistically significant between-population differentiation. In addition, the genetic structure of Oaxacan populations did not fit an isolation-by-distance model. Finally, using AMOVA and a Bayesian clustering approach, we did not detect significant geographic or linguistic barriers to gene flow within Oaxaca. These results suggest that the indigenous communities of Oaxaca, although culturally isolated, can be genetically defined as a large, nearly panmictic population in which migration could be a more important population mechanism than genetic drift. Finally, compared with outgroups in Mexico (both indigenous peoples and Mestizos), three groups were apparent. Among them, only the Otomí population from Hidalgo has a different culture and language.     

Madness, fear, and control in Bangladesh: clashing bodies of power/knowledge

This article presents an understanding of how Bangladeshis cope with madness in relation to two assumptions: that systems of knowledge and of power are coterminous, and that actors in medical encounters draw on incompatible and unequal bodies of knowledge-power I first offer a perspective on psychiatry, emotion, and discourse in Bangladesh as a society increasingly caught up in globalizing modernity. Then I present two types of data to illumine tensions between various attempts to control the fears associated with schizophrenia. The first is a set of exchanges in the advice column of a new popular psychiatry magazine in Bangladesh that inculcate new perspectives on self Those who write to the editors signal their fears of what might, in the end, be impossible to control. Answers from the psychiatrists who edit the magazine reflect discourses circulating on the web, at international conferences, and at the institutions in the United Kingdom and the United States where one of them received his training. The second data set consists of video recordings of persons diagnosed with schizophrenia interacting with families and/or psychiatrists. In part because of knowledge-power asymmetries, attempts at controlling fears surrounding schizophrenia in these four cases fail to address the depths, tacitness, embodiment, and narrative embedding of anxieties experienced by all parties. I close with an argument about the implications for theories of culture and of medical pluralism that arise from cases in which the local Self is experienced from the perspective of powerful Others.