Makuna: Portrait of an Amazonian People Latin America South America Colombia Kaj Arhem Smithsonian Books illustrated edition edition

Jul 31

The beauty of the Amazon rain forest is evident by just flipping through Diego Samper’s spectacular photographs of the flora and fauna (including humans) that inhabit this lush, mysterious land. Arhem spent much time with the Makuna people, a peaceful, craft-driven tribe whose male members weave baskets while the women bake; in fact, many of the Makuna rituals are based on the proliferation of the tribe and fertility. At one point the author goes on a peccary hunt with one of the Makuna and comes face-to-face with a wounded animal; he also participates in tribal ceremonies, all of which are portrayed in colorful, fascinating photos. There is even a “Generation X” problem, as the tradition-bound elders bemoan the embrace of modern weaponry by the young, and there is also the problem of interloping white outsiders who are in the Amazon Basin looking for gold. Arhem’s vivid travelogue is a celebration not just of the beauty of the rain forest but also of the proud people who live and work there every day. Joe Collins

Stunning photographs, 95 color, nine b&w, of Amazonian rain forests by Diego Samper give Makuna: Portrait of an Amazonian People more depth than the typical anthropological study. Sociologist Kaj rhem, who has visited the Makuna frequently since 1972, provides a compelling narrative as well, with in-depth accounts of Makuna culture, creation myths, and the inevitable challenges of the encroaching world.Publishers Weekly

Highly recommended for both public and academic libraries.Library Journal

Sampers often spectacular photos of the Makuna and their environment also span nearly two decades of work.Journal of Anthropological Research –This text refers to the Paperback edition.

In stunning, full-color photographs and evocative text, Samper and Arhem celebrate the natural surroundings, domestic life, and vibrant rituals of a rain-forest people whose future is being jeopardized by outsiders’ destruction of their lands.

Highly recommended for both public and academic libraries.Library Journal

Sampers often spectacular photos of the Makuna and their environment also span nearly two decades of work.Journal of Anthropological Research –This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Makuna: Portrait of an Amazonian People

Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians

In the early 1960s, the French anthropologist Pierre Clastres spent two years living among the Guayaki people of Paraguay, a tiny community of nomadic hunters whose way of life was quickly disappearing. When Clastres arrived in Paraguay, there were only 100 Guayaki left, and their culture seemed doomed by influenza and encroaching civilization. Clastres’s description of his encounters with these people is respectful, self-aware, and written with great skill. Paul Auster (author of The New York Trilogy and the movie Smoke) translated the book from French to English in the late 1970s, sent it to a publisher, and then lost track of the manuscript for 20 years. Fortunately, one of Auster’s fans stumbled upon the manuscript in a used-book store in 1996 and brought it to the author, making this publication possible.

According to Clastres, the Guayaki were mild-mannered folk who relished the taste of human flesh. There were far more men than women in the community, which seems sort of sinister. Every June, when the air was cold enough to make the bees logy, all the Guayaki groups gathered for a honey festival, which featured tickling games and many sexual adventures. In short, the Guayaki led lives very different from our own. There is something deeply satisfying about learning the details of faraway, drastically foreign lives. Clastres manages to describe these people’s daily lives and traditions without making them seem exotic or sensationalizing their story. Clastres’s quiet, detailed observations honor this vanished culture and should be of interest to anthropologists and layman alike. –Jill Marquis

Pierre Clastres was one of the most respected political anthropologists of our time. Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians is an account of his first fieldwork in the early 1960s–an encounter with a small, unique, and now vanished Paraguayan tribe. From “Birth” to “The End,” Clastres follows the Guayakis in their everyday lives, determined to record every detail of their history, ritual, myths, and culture in order to answer the many questions prompted by his personal experiences. Now available for the first time in English in a beautiful translation by the novelist Paul Auster, Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians will alter radically not only the Western academic conventions in which other cultures are thought but also the discipline of political anthropology itself.

Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians

Smithsonian Books illustrated edition editionKaj Arhem

Comments

Rich Morey

July 31st, 2012 at 8:56 PM


Pierre Clastres (1934-1979) was one of the most respected and insightful anthropologists of his day. Chronicle Of The Guayaki Indians (ably translated and with a foreword by Paul Auster) is a vivid and compelling account of his first fieldwork in the early 1960s which included an encounter with a small, unique, and now vanished Paraguayan tribe — the Guayaki. Clastres followed the Guayaki in their everyday lives, determined to record every detail of their history, ritual, myths, and culture. In doing so he had also created a monument of political anthropology which would commemorate a Native American peoples that was to swiftly pass from scene. Chronicle Of The Guayaki Indians is an important addition to any serious anthropology and Native South American studies reference collection.
Rich Toyser

August 1st, 2012 at 2:51 AM


This is a wonderful book and as Auster’s points out in the preface it’s impossible not to love it. But this is also a sad story about our time. Clastres felt that, how tribes and ancient cultures are doom to dissapear. In a way this book is written with a heart full of melancholy.
SpotTheDog

August 1st, 2012 at 10:55 AM


It came as a pleasant surprise to discover that the author of this book was an understudy of Claude Levi-Strauss for, the latter’s Tristes Tropiques elicited an intellectual epiphany in this reviewer.
This is not to say that Claustres’ writing is anywhere near as good as Levi-Strauss’, even though this chronicle of his one year plus association with the Guayaki, or Atchei Gatu, Indians of Paraguay in 1963-64 is a compelling, worthwhile read.
Claustres’ task was to gather as much information as he could about the tribe’s daily life, customs, ‘religious’ beliefs, family and tribal structures, tool use, etc. In short, or long, everything of note that he can observe. Indeed, the book is brim full of interesting, often fascinating, information and the author successfully brings the tribe to life in the reader’s mind.
In fact, to examine the life of the Other, you need go no further than this book, for the life these Indians led is so out of the bounds of modern mores that they come off as an altogether different species of human.
I know that today it is acceptable only to lament the displacement of the aboriginal population of the New World by the denizens of the Old, but it strikes one that no reasonable person would countenance the Atchei Gatu order of things, assuming that Claustres’ account is accurate. Granted some people would celebrate a reality that includes Incest, internecine human sacrifice, infanticide, geriatric murder, polyandry, pedophilia, open marriage, and cannbialism, albeit not, evidently, onanism. For most of us, however, the the Atchei Gatu way of life must fill us with revulsion. Their tribal life is voyeurisitically interesting, to be sure, but also repulsive and reading about it causes one to realize that, as portrayed, there really should be no place for it in our world.
This book though is a worthwhile read. A few comments, the drawings of the native implements are beautifully rendered and the photos are charming. One does wish that the author or translator had given a guide to pronouncing the native words that are liberally sprinkled throughout the text.
Finally, one does sometimes question the veracity of this account. It is not so much that the material is sensationalized or beggars belief, but much of what is there does beg questions. For instance, the tribal members have wonderfully descriptive names that are supposedly bestowed upon them according to spiritual connections made before birth, yet surely the sex-hungry elderly woman ‘Perechankangi’ or ‘Vagina of Dry Wood’ was not called that from birth. Also, author goes into elaborate detail about the daily life of these forest indians but he encountered the tribe after it had left the forest and it is difficult to believe that his account of their daily life is first hand, observed knowledge, rather than an account of what has been told to him and this is only a couple of the obvious intellectual contradictions that fill the book.
In fact, that is the biggest problem with the book. One is forced to question how much of the account is a transmission of knowledge intuited and inferred by the author, I wouldn’t dare say manufactured, and how much of it is verified factual information.
Still, this makes the book no less readable nor any less recommended.
Cowpoke

August 2nd, 2012 at 3:42 AM


Contrary to the above reviews, the Guayakí have not “disappeared.” At present, they are rarely referred to as “guayakí” (it is offensive to them), favoring the name “Aché.” Their nomadic subsistence is sadly gone, but many aspects of the culture continue in the Aché communities. For a physical anthropological study of the Aché-Guayakí and a brief history of the contact, check out Kim Hill and Magdalena Hurtado’s “Aché Life History.” Its out-of-print and hard to find but provides an interesting, albeit academic, complement to Clastres’ work.
Rob P

August 2nd, 2012 at 12:53 PM


an anthropological tour de force that breaks your heart as you witness firsthand the cultural and material desecration of this once proud and self-sufficient tribe. their view of life and death seems the direct opposite of our western way of thinking, and one can only hope that they are right in the end. much credit must be given to the author–and novelist/translator paul auster– who uncovered the lost, sad truths of this forgotten world. the writing is candid, pure,lyrical, incandescent, potent and non-academic. a haunting, haunting book–it literally speaks truth and wisdon from the grave.
VeeRaPab

August 3rd, 2012 at 2:26 AM


I was stunned when I first read this book. No point of detail, from the first period of a tribeswoman to stories tales and legends of the Indians, is missed. Pierre Clastres takes the reader with him on a journey which took place in the early 1960′s to find a people and place which have now past. His subtle evocation and immersion in a sense of place by concentrating on day to day detail of the indians life is breathtaking. It is worth noting that the translator is the writer Paul Auster, who carried out this translation in the mid seventies when he was impoverished. Due to a series of misadventures his translation was lost and if it was not for it re-emerging almost by accident then it may never have seen the light of day. Paul’s illuminating and inspired telling of this aspect of the story is worth reading in itself and is a beautiful piece of writing.

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