The Culture of the Huaorani of Ecuador
“In the Eastern part of Ecuador stretches el Oriente, the jungle. Between the Napo and Curaray Rivers are 600,000 hectares of land that is the home of the Huaorani, feared warriors of the Amazon Rainforest. This territory includes Yasuni National Park, one of the most bio-diverse places on the planet. Unfortunate for the Huaorani, it also includes hundreds of kilometers of oil pipes and several oil company stations that are having a devastating effect on this fragile tropical ecosystem” (Cuna, 2007, para. 1). Due to encroachment on their territory by outsiders, there are fewer than 2,000 Huaoranis left today. In this paper, I will provide an overview, as well as analyze and evaluate how the
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Additionally, some elder warriors are believed to have special powers to transform themselves into the jaguar.
Gender relations of the Huaorani may vary but ensure equal distribution of responsibilities. Generally, the males support the family by means of hunting. They typically hunt using spears or blowguns. The Huaorani men cut small areas of trees so the women can harvest necessary crops for rituals and consumption. The men are the defenders of their land, and will participate in combat if necessary against intruders (Lu, F. E., 2001). While it is very uncommon to find, women can hunt to support their family as well. However, their primary jobs within their groups are to care for the children, plant and harvests crops, as well as maintain their homes. Everyone has their own chores to do within the home, so that the chores are equal (Lu, F. E., 2001).
Within the nanicabo chores are jointly undertaken, and all food and material goods are shared. There is sexual division of labor, on which men take the priority responsibility for hunting while the women take primary responsibility for gardening, gathering from the forest, cooking, and child care; however, among the Huaorani all of these lines are fluid and flexible (Robarchek and Robarchek, 1998, p. 104-6: Yost, 1981, p.691).
The social organization of the Huaorani people denotes an amazing continuous adaptation to their environment. They are highly skilled and have vast experience in
Shaki, or Napoleon A. Chagnon’s 15 month enculturation with the Yanomamo tribe, Bisaasi-teri is characterized by fear, discomfort, loneliness, nosiness, and invaluable experiences through relationships and modesty about human culture. Chagnon documents the experience through the struggle and discovery surrounding his proposed research, as his lifestyle gradually comes in sync with the natural functions of his community. Much of his focus and time was consumed by identification of genealogical records, and the establishment of informants and methods of trustworthy divulgence. Marriage, sex, and often resulting violence are the foremost driving forces within Yanomamo, and everything that we
Culture makes up who we are, what we believe and how we behave. About four years ago, I had the opportunity to live in Ecuador. I found the relationships and communication perspective to be very interesting and after spending two years there, I was able to notice several distinct intercultural differences between the American and Ecuadorian cultures. Since my analysis of Ecuador is only based off of my personal experience, I’ve also invited my friend Luis Salas from Quito, Ecuador who is currently attending Brigham Young University to give his own insights. By gaining his perspective of what it’s like to live in America as an
Families assembled in spring to angle, in early winter to chase, and in the mid year they isolated to develop singular planting fields. Young men were educated in the method for the forested areas, where a man's aptitude at chasing and capacity to get by under all conditions were imperative to his family's prosperity. Ladies were prepared from their most punctual years to work perseveringly in the fields and around the family wetu, a round or oval house that was intended to be effortlessly disassembled and moved in only a couple of hours. They likewise figured out how to accumulate and handle normal foods grown from the ground, other create from the living space, and their harvests. The creation of sustenance among the Wampanoag was like that of numerous Native American social orders. Nourishment propensities were partitioned along gendered lines. Men and ladies had particular undertakings. Local ladies assumed a dynamic part in a hefty portion of the phases of nourishment creation. Since the Wampanoag depended fundamentally on products gathered from this sort of work, ladies had vital socio-political, financial, and profound parts in their groups. Wampanoag men were for the most part in charge of chasing and angling, while ladies dealt with cultivating and the social event of wild organic products, nuts, berries, shellfish, and so on. Ladies were in charge of up to seventy-five percent of all sustenance
There were a ton of gender differences going on in both Sonqo and Yanomamo. In Sonqo, the major gender differences, to me, were shown numerously in traditional rituals performed. Every tradition was performed by a man and the men always played the most important part. An example of this was when they would share the bundles of coca for chewing. During the exchange of these, men always received it
The oral history of these people talk about how groups or bands of people were entrusted to care for the environment and resources within their ancestral territory (About The Hualapai Nation, 22). They are descendants of a group called the Cerbat (“Hualapai Tribe”). The tribe’s ancestral territory estimated to be about five million acres (About The Hualapai
B. There is equality between Kung men and Kung women. Their duties hold an equal amount of weight in importance within the community. Women take care of the home and handle most of the domestic work. They raise the children, collect raw foods, and also hunt small game. Kung women maintain the household while the men are off hunting for days at a time and are the primary distributors of goods and food amongst the tribe to make sure things are shared equally. Men handle all dangerous activities, especially hunting, and they contribute to cooking, tribal decisions (when they move, etc.) and building and making things.
and the North American culture that we have adapted to, but just at there is
Deforestation poses an alarming threat to Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, and it has been a serious concern for over 40 years. For thousands of years, the abundant, valuable resources in the Amazon were familiar only to the indigenous people of the region. In the 1500’s, before European colonization of Brazil, there were an estimated six to nine million individuals part of different cultures that made up a rich Amazonian society (“History”). Surrounded by the luxuriant rainforest and its natural resources, these indigenous tribes were able to thrive by utilizing the resources without destroying their habitat. After European emigration, the government of Brazil exploited the value of the Amazon’s resources in the twentieth century. In the 1970’s, the Brazilian government discovered the “untapped source of boundless potential” hiding in the Amazon and began using incentives to persuade settlers to develop its resources (Casey). Once economists realized the importance of the resources found within the rainforest, European pioneers set out to transform the Amazon into their home. By endorsing colonization, the government could not only boost the country’s economy, but also gain control over Brazil’s vast territory. The government supported migration to the rainforest and campaigned for the construction of infrastructure (“History”). In concurrence, the development of roads such as the Trans-Amazonian Highway, a 2,000 mile road built in 1972, granted people and machinery entrance to
Like in most hunter-gatherer societies, The Mukogodo and Hadza both have a sexual division of labor, where the men and women often engage in different types of work. These two communities are similar in the fact that men are often the ones who are often spending more time foraging or gaining wealth and women often take care of the more domestic work and child rearing. For example, in both societies women are the ones who are fetching water and firewood for the home, and in the Mukogodo world it is common to see women carrying as many as thirty liters of water. Among the Mukogodo women spend 16% of their time taking care of domestic needs, while men only spend about 4%. However, Mukogodo men outweigh woman in earning wages, where they spend 11% of their time doing so. In both societies the women are the ones who do the processing and cooking of food. Another similarity in regards to labor, is that children from both societies start working and foraging from a young age. Among the Hadza, by the time children are 8 years old they go foraging with the women
Initially, I was an Ecuadorian girl that had a Christian family, I grew up surrounded by my family and loved ones. My cognitive development was in progress, and I had created fundamental bonds in Ecuador. Provided that my dad is an American citizen and due to his work in America, he could not spend too much time with us in Ecuador, so, my mom, my little brother, and I immigrated to America. After three years of my life, our family reunited, and I became an Ecuadorian-American. Since I was very young, assimilating the changes came to be unnoticed, if it weren’t for the fact that during the next years I spoke Spanish at home and English at school. As a result, my translations of these languages affected my communication, creating slow comprehensive
The Yanomamo, the largest isolated tribe in South America, are a hunter-gatherer community with multiple unique characteristics of their culture. This society is very underdeveloped due to their isolation, for example their technology is not near what developed countries have experienced over the past century. The main technological feature is the clay pot, and since it is fragile, the men handle the cooking due to the fact that women are seen as “clumsy”. This is one of the many examples that show the male dominance this tribal culture experiences. Another example would be the preference of male children, this, however, has caused issues within the society because being decidedly masculine results in marriage issues. These issues include friction among the men due to pining over the minimal amount of females along with marriage between tribes due to no eligible availability of women. Apart from the male dominance and technology, everyday life is simple for the most part. Women tend to the children and gather food for the tribes while the men hunt- hence the term
The men and women on Wogeo both lead very different lives, this is made clear by the distinct rituals that each sex participates in throughout their life, the roles held in tribal events as well as the strict customs that are adhered to in the daily life. Now, though the men and women have very different customs that they practice, both sexes of Wogeo are noticeably similar on a social scale. The truth is that on the island of Wogeo the tribes are male dominated. Through practiced customs and social norms the women of Wogeo are able to increase their social status to be on par with that of the men.
They are conscious about passageway, rivers and valleys. The Mbuti hunts through traps, nets and arrows. Bend over hunting is masculine issue, at the same time as net hunting is completed by both sexes; (women and men). The men rest in the traps and the women attempt to redden nature out of their defeating spot. Some animals they hunt are the antelopes, ants, crawfish, pigs, worms, insects, snails, monkeys and fishes. The head of the hunters shares all the meat with his grouping. A further leader technique of achieving food is plundering. This is when women and men explore the jungle headed in groups gathering every sort of plants: honey, roots, fruits, leaves, wild yams, berries and cola nuts etc.
The Ju/’hoansi bushmen are semi-nomadic people that live on the boarders of the Kalahari Desert. This people are traditionally hunter-gathers. Deciding to join their lifestyle will ultimately change
The Agta people show equality within genders through their means of sustenance—foraging. According to Estioko-Griffin and Griffin, the Agta women have evidently shown much participation—equal to the men—when dealing with hunting and gathering food resources. However, it has also been stated that there is a slight presence of sexual division of labor. For example, when hunting, most women do not directly hunt by bows and arrows, traps, or machetes, depending on the geographical region in which they live. What most do instead is that they assist the men during the hunt (Estioko-Griffin & Griffin 2012: 125). Nevertheless, their involvement in the hunting is quite significant. The Agta women help carry game—or wild animals—back home, which is no small feat, since such game consists of hefty pigs and deer. In regions such as the Malibu River, there are women who are deemed as proficient in hunting with bows and arrows (Estioko-Griffin & Griffin 2012: 126). Another means of obtaining food is through fishing, an activity equally performed by both genders. The only selectivity exhibited is when a woman is either pregnant or physically older; however, such