XINGU INDIGENOUS PARK
In its 2,642,003 hectares, the local landscape exhibits great biodiversity, in a region of ecological transition, from savannas and drier semideciduous forests in the south to the Amazon rainforest in the north, with savannas, fields, lowland forests, terra firme and forests in Terras Pretas Arqueológicas. The climate alternates between a rainy season, from November to April, when the rivers are full and fish are scarce, and a dry period in the remaining months, when the tracajá turtle and large inter-village ceremonies take place.
To the south of the Park are the formers of the Xingu River, which makes up a river basin. which finally came to fruition. Despite the legislative and executive powers of Mato Grosso being represented in this roundtable, including by its governor, the state began to grant, within this perimeter, land to colonizing companies. Therefore, when the Xingu National Park was finally created, by Decree nº 50.455, of 04/14/1961, signed by President Jânio Quadros, its area corresponded to only a quarter of the initially proposed surface. The Park was regulated by Decree nº 51.084, of 07/31/1961; adjustments were made by Decrees No. 63,082, of 6/08/1968, and No. 68,909, of 13/07/1971, with the demarcation of its current perimeter having been finally made in 1978. Batovi, Kurisevo and Kuluene; this being the main trainer of the Xingu, when it meets the Batovi-Ronuro. The administrative demarcation of the Park was approved in 1961, with an area incident in part of the Mato Grosso municipalities of Canarana, Paranatinga, São Félix do Araguaia, São José do Xingu, Gaúcha do Norte, Feliz Natal, Querência, União do Sul, Nova Ubiratã and Marcelândia .
In the south are people very similar culturally, comprising the cultural area of Alto Xingu, whose ethnicities are served by the Indigenous Post Leonardo Villas Bôas. In the Middle Xingu are os Trumai, os Ikpeng e os kaiabi, served by the Pavuru Post. To the north are os Suya, Yudjá e Kaiabi, attended by the Diauarum Post. Each Post supports the logistics of projects and activities developed in the Park, such as education and health, all of which have a UBS (Basic Health Unit), where indigenous health agents and Unifesp (Federal University of São Paulo) employees work. with Funasa. There are also eleven surveillance posts on the borders of the territory, on the banks of the main rivers that form the Xingu.
In the 1980s, the first invasions of fishermen and hunters into the PIX territory began. At the end of the 1990s, fires on livestock farms located northeast of the Park threatened to affect it and the advance of logging companies located to the west began to approach the physical limits defined by the demarcation. Furthermore, the occupation of the surroundings began to pollute the sources of the rivers that supply the Park and that were outside the demarcated area. In this process, the perception that an uncomfortable “hug” is on the way was strengthened among the residents of PIX: the Park has been surrounded by the process of occupation of its surroundings and is already evident as an “island” of forests in the midst of the pasture and monoculture in the Xingu region.
During the 1990s, the Natives preoccupation with these threats stimulated a significant number of new territorial claims. Two of them, which were attended to, resulted in the Wawi and Batovi Indigenous Lands, respectively of the Suyá and the Wauja, approved in 1998. Added to these, the Park extension reached 2,797,491 hectares.
Continuing this process, the Ikpeng are currently articulating to claim part of their traditional territory in the region of the Jatobá River, which was left outside the demarcation. The Wauja are also negotiating for the region called Kamukuaká, considered sacred and located on a farm next to the Park, to be transformed into an environmental preservation area.
The issue of monitoring the territory is a sure presence on the agenda of political affairs in the Park, being discussed both in meetings of leaders and assemblies of Atix (Associação Terra Indígena Xingu) and in dialogue with Funai and the federal (Ibama) and state environmental agencies. (State Environmental Foundation - FEMA).
To this end, an infrastructure of the aforementioned eleven surveillance posts was set up to protect the areas that provide direct access to the Park, such as the intersection of the main rivers with the limits of the PIX and the point where the BR-080 borders these limits. .
However, the service station system, by itself, is not enough to face the situations created by the surroundings and has been complemented by other actions, developed under the Fronteiras Project, a partnership between Atix and ISA. The project comprises the mapping of deforestation dynamics, through satellite photos, and the in loco identification of new occupation vectors in the surroundings of the PIX. It also includes training for the Chefes de Postos, the restoration and maintenance of the landmarks that establish the physical limits of the territory and a georeferenced database of all the farmers whose properties border the PIX. This work allows the Indians to closely monitor what happens on the Park's borders and mobilizes communities about external threats, both in inter-village discussions and with the responsible public bodies (Funai, Ibama and the state government).
Portuguese is used as a language of contact between different ethnicities, being spoken more fluently by young men and adults. Lately, the number of Portuguese speakers has been increasing and many young women are beginning to speak and understand the language.
Nowadays, with the large number of roads connecting the PIX to the cities and farms, many Indians circulate around the Park, using the Portuguese language for commercial transactions and other forms of relationship with the regional population. Through television, present in almost every village, the Portuguese language is also learned. Furthermore, in schools, indigenous teachers teach how to speak and write in Portuguese, although all classes are taught in native languages.
As for the mastery of more than one indigenous language, among the peoples of the Upper Xingu it is common to understand the languages of their neighbors, even if they do not know how to speak them, so that Indians of different ethnicities eventually dialogue each one in their own language. Among the Kaiabi, Kĩsêdjê and Yudja there is also a mutual understanding of languages, due to living in the same region and intermarriage. In addition, in all the villages in the Park, children and young people who are the result of interethnic marriages tend to master both their parents languages. And there are young people who speak four or even five languages.
SOCIETY
In Alto Xingu, the villages are made up of communal houses arranged in an oval perimeter, around a square with dirt floors. In the center of this square is the so-called men's house. In addition to being a mass meeting point, the building hides the sacred flutes, forbidden to the female gaze, which are therefore played inside the house or at night in the courtyard, when the women are gathered.
The center of the square is also the place where the dead are buried, where rituals are performed, where ceremonial payments are made, where the chief receives messengers from other groups and delivers his speeches to the local group; it is still there that the men fight (huka huka, described in item The long Kwarup ritual) between members of different villages during all formal meetings.
The houses are thatched. The domestic group of each dwelling is usually composed of a nucleus of male brothers and their respective families, to which parallel cousins and eventual ascendants are added. The leader of this domestic group is the so-called "owner of the house" , responsible for coordinating productive activities and other daily tasks that involve the residents.
Ideally, the rules of residence prescribe that, in the first years of marriage, the husband must reside in the house of the in-laws, paying in services for the transfer of their daughter. After this period, the couple usually goes to live in the husband's home. This rule may not apply to "householders" , the village leader or those already married to another woman. In these situations, from the beginning the woman lives in her husband's house, and the payment is made through goods. Preferred marriage is ideally between cross cousins. The link between the houses is established through alliances made through marriages and through common support to the village leader.
The internal space of the house does not include divisions, except for the offices where adolescents in puberty confinement, couples with newborn children and widows in the period of mourning are kept. The formation of a person in the Upper Xingu implies such periods of seclusion. In the case of men, they began to systematically receive teachings on male labor and huka-huka fighting techniques in puberty confinement. The longer the imprisonment, the greater the social responsibilities and leadership that must be assumed in the community. During this period, sex should be avoided so that the young person becomes a good fighter.
The political unit par excellence in the Upper Xingu is the village, whose leader acts as a mediator and regulator of conflicts, and must be generous and maintain the group's internal harmony. The chief's power, of a markedly peaceful nature, depends on the group's consent, especially on the support of the leaders of domestic groups. His political skill is expressed in words, in speeches and exhortations in the square. The rules for succession to village leader status are flexible and often create a lot of competition for the position.
On the other hand, the "owner of the house" is, ultimately, the one who took the initiative to build it. Ideally, your firstborn should succeed you. The main attributions of the owner of the house are the transmission of requests from the village leader to his domestic group regarding daily tasks, which he also coordinates.
Each house forms a unit of economic cooperation relatively independent of the others, especially in the case of women's activities (in this regard, see the item "productive activities". In the evening, after such activities, families usually stay at the doors of the houses, talking, manipulating each other's bodies (shaving hair, picking up lice, combing their hair, etc.). Young people usually paint and decorate themselves. Older men can smoke and chat in the men's house. At the beginning of the night, everyone starts to retire and the nuclear families gather around their respective fires, where they have their last meal and then sleep.
ACTIVITIES AND EXCHANGES
O fish, beiju and porridge (the latter two made from the processing of wild manioc) constitute the main food items for the peoples of the south of the Park. The ethnicities of the northern and central regions eat red meat and have a more varied agriculture. In any case, fishing and agriculture represent the core of productive activities.
In the Upper Xingu, cassava production is carried out in gardens cultivated by nuclear families, but which have the support of the entire domestic group and are coordinated by their leader, the so-called “dono da casa”. The men prepare the swidden and the women remove the manioc from the soil. In the village, the manioc is processed by the woman, who extracts the pulp and the starch, both fundamental ingredients for the preparation of beiju. The removal of the manioc poisonous juice is done by pressing the mass inside a small rolled-up stalk mat. Another food obtained from manioc is mohete (in kamaiurá), a thick, sweetened broth that results from boiling the water that washed the pulp.
While in the dry season fish is part of the daily diet, in the rains its relative scarcity is compensated with more varied food, such as corn, papaya, pumpkin, watermelon, among others. Agriculture also includes the cultivation of other plants both for ceremonial purposes (such as annatto and tobacco) and to serve the production of various artisanal goods (such as gourd and cotton).
The hunting of some birds and small animals, as well as the collection of wild fruits, also contribute to a varied diet, but play a secondary role in terms of food production. With regard to hunting, male work is almost always individual, the main objectives being to guarantee food for the harpy eagle, replace fish in the diet of people affected by food taboos and obtain feathers for the production of handicrafts.
In collecting, the work is usually collective and involves the participation of women and children. The main products are honey, pequi, genipap, mangaba, ants, tracajá eggs and firewood. Among them, the chestnut extracted from the pequi stands out from the others as a ceremonial food distributed on the occasion of inter-village ceremonies. The fruit of the pequi tree is abundant during the height of the rains, in January and February, and each village is usually surrounded by extensive plantations of this tree. The pequi is processed at the time of collection and is partly stored under water until the Kwarup season (dry season), when, together with the smoked fish and the cassava and beiju porridge, it constitutes the ceremonial food par excellence. The pequi is eaten raw, roasted or diluted in cassava porridge.
Regarding the production of artifacts and clothing, metal items, on which almost all male productive activities depend, have not fully replaced the indigenous craft used by women in food production. Thus, metal pots and cauldrons compete with the gourds used in the transport and storage of water, without, however, threatening the position of the ceramic pots, obtained through the exchange with the Wauja group.
Among the peoples of the Upper Xingu, each one is recognized for a certain productive specialty, which allows him to participate in a system of exchanges with others. Thus, large ceramic pots, with a flat bottom and thick, outward-facing edges, are a Wauja specialty. The bows of hard black wood are made exclusively by the Kamaiurá. The necklaces and belts made of jaguar claws and snail discs are made by the Karib-speaking peoples (Kalapalo, Kuikuro, Matipu and Nahukuá). Salt (not sodium chloride, but potassium) is extracted from water hyacinth and stored by the Aweti, Mehinako and Trumai. Before the introduction of metal tools, stone axes were supplied by the Trumai, who had the raw material in their territory, whose control was gained by the Kisêdje.
To a large extent, transactions involving the exchange of these and other products take place in an eventCharacteristic of the Upper Xingu called moitará, which can be of two types: carried out between houses in the same village or between different villages. In the first case, it is carried out on the initiative of only the men or women of a particular house, who come to the other with the objects they want to exchange. Each article is passed from hand to hand by the interested inhabitants of the visited house, until one of them deposits what he wants to give in return. If the trade is accepted by the visitor, he lifts the counter-offer from the floor. Once the transactions are carried out, the visiting men or women, who can be received with pequi nuts and manioc porridge, leave. And then they wait for the return of their visit, when new exchanges are made.
The moitará between villages is usually carried out in the dry season and has the joint participation of both sexes. The village that takes the initiative goes on an expedition, led by its chief, to another, carrying the objects it wants to exchange. Although the objects are individually owned, transactions are mediated by the chiefs of the two villages. The exchanges involve ceramics, necklaces, belts, feather ornaments, weapons, canoes, flutes, sleeping and fishing hammocks, baskets, gourds, salt, pepper, food and animals, especially dogs, as well as goods belonging to the whites. Before the exchanges take place, the men fight huka-kuka.
KWARUP
The Kwarup (ritual name in language kamaiurá, as he became better known) is considered the great emblem of the Upper Xingu, both by its members and outsiders, and is even known by residents of large cities in Brazil, through the media. It is a funerary ceremony, which involves creation myths of humanity, the hierarchical classification in groups, the initiation of young women and the relationships between the villages.
Both the leader or village owner and the house owners have a different form of burial. In the case of "ordinary" inhabitants, the body is wrapped in a hammock, laid in a pit, then covered with a mat, on which earth is placed. For chiefs, there are at least two types of burial. In one of them, the body is tied to a wooden frame similar to a ladder, and introduced into the pit so that it stands upright, facing east; in the other, two holes are dug, at a distance of three meters from each other, and connected by a tunnel. A pole is placed in each hole. The body is placed in a net that passes through the tunnel and has its wrists tied to the posts. In both cases a burial chamber is built, as the mouths of the caves are covered with mats and upturned ceramic pots, on top of which the earth is placed.
Sometime after the burial of a leader, those who prepared the body and deposited it in the tomb ask the deceased close relatives to erect a fence around the grave. The acceptance of the request by one of them is the beginning of the Kwarup ritual, which comprises a long period. Its closure occurs in the dry season, during the spawning time of the tracajá turtle, around August or September. For this final ceremony, the village that is hosting the Kwarup invites the other Upper Xingu groups.
During the months that follow until the closing, not necessarily every day, two types of dances and the playing of long flutes (uruá, in the language of the Kamaiurá) take place, always reciprocated with the offering of food by the “owners” of Kwarup. The guiding focus of these ritual activities is always the fence over the grave.
The ideal of inviting as many villages as possible to the rite is limited by the availability of food and the state of relations between them. A messenger, taken from the group of gravediggers, with two companions, is sent to each one to make the invitation, guided by an etiquette that is well known to them.
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