Guerreiros do Norte: memórias de um tempo histórico para uma etnografia Yawalapiti

• Autor(a) principal: Rocha, Adelino de Lucena Mendes da
• Data de Publicação: 2014
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações da PUC_SP
• Texto Completo: https://tede2.pucsp.br/handle/handle/3585
• topic: Yawalapiti; Etno-história; Reconstrução; Alto-Xingu; Ethnohistory; Reconstruction; CNPQ::CIENCIAS SOCIAIS APLICADAS

This thesis aims to reconstruct the history, as the basis of the permanent identity, of the Yawalapiti, an Aruak-speaking Indian people who live on the left margin of the Tuatuari river, a tributary of the Xingu river. The Yawalapiti were part of the early migrations of the Aruak-Maipure peoples as they reached the Upper Xingu territory where, in conjunction with other Indian groups, there formed what is known as the Xinguan social system. This system is constituted by a number of variegated Indian peoples, coming from different regions, speaking different languages, who recognize themselves as partner members, share the same inter-village rituals, cosmological repertoires, and practice a common way of life. These basic social characteristics are articulated by means of traditional trade relations among some of these groups as well as through group inter-marriage, which constitutes one of the main pillars of Xinguan social sustainability. The present work takes as its foundation the earliest memories of the Yawalapiti, even before they reached the Xingu river basin, when the name of the very first historical Yawalapiti leader is recorded. These early memories relate the difficulties the Yawalapiti experienced on the Tuatuari river basin, the battles with enemy groups, witchcraft, and, finally, the encounter with white people. A strong remembrance, which will eventually help reinforce Yawalapiti social identity, is the demise of the last autonomous Yawalapiti village at the time they were exiled on Lahatuá lands. Equally significant in yawalapiti cultural memory are the arrival of white people, their return to öuyá and the Aimakapuko villages, where they begin to grow in population. This thesis also stresses the importance of the Typa-Typa village, the cosmology and a brief exercise on the ethnic permanence of the Yawalapiti. The methodology of this work is based on open interviews aimed to bring out old yawalapiti memories and narratives, collected by the present author during the many stays in the Typa-Typa village over the years from 2005, to 2013, as well as bibliographical research