Projects

Although it is well known that South American Lowlands Indigenous peoples have a remarkably sophisticated material life (Santos Granero 2009; Miller 2019), few recent studies have explicitly focused on the subject. Likewise, despite a surge in research volume, descriptions emphasizing affinity-based relationships overshadow those focused on descent relations (either between humans or with mythical ancestors). This project aims to contribute to discussions on the region's diverse object regimes, emphasizing ritual contexts where the creation of ornaments, musical instruments, and other artifacts handed down from one generation to the next is directly tied to more vertical relations or the "recapitulation of the development of the ancestral stock" (Goldman, 2004, p. 186). Focusing on life-cycle rituals among the Cubeo in Northwest Amazon and Bororo in Central Brazil – whose study can be considered as constitutive of South Americanist anthropology (Lévi-Strauss 1936; Goldman 1968) and who both figure among the very rare true segmentary societies of Lowland South America (Viveiros de Castro 1996, p.188),– our project stands out by shifting attention to nomination and male initiation as key to intergenerational transmission, in order to shed new light on Amazonian ritual paraphernalia and the history of Anthropology.

Participants :

Philippe Erikson

Maria Luisa Lucas

Manon Hias

Pedro Almeida Meniconi