Multispeces Myths: Interspecific Myth and Experience in the Amazon

• Paride Bollettin Departamento de Antropología, Universidad de Durham

Keywords: Myth, Amerindians, multispecies, turtles, becoming

Abstract

Mythical narratives, in their Amerindian styles, fascinated anthropological reflections in different directions. A classical starting point, proposed by Lévi-Strauss, appoints in these narratives the recognition of the indissolubility of interspecific experiences as feature of human lives. This paper describes how the Mebengokré people of eastern Amazon produce multiple relations with the turtles. Having as a starting point a mythical narrative, in seuence it will introduce hunting techniques used to hunt turtles, a specific music learned from the turtles, and the ritualistic practices associated with
these. The description of these relations’ role in the reciprocal production of humans and animals, both at practical and semiotic levels, will highlight how a complex web of interspecific influences emerges. Such description will be, in sequence, contextualized in the contemporary debates about human and
non-human relations in the production of shared Worlds. Finally, the paper will discuss specific forms in which diverse subjectivities build up a common becoming. This becoming appears as a resonance between shared Worlds, as dissolution of interspecific borders and epistemological dichotomies. In this way, the described Amerindian myth will emerge as a reflection on interspecific relations.

References

Albert, B. (2002). O ouro canibal e a queda do céu: Uma crítica xamânica da economia política da natureza (Yanomami), Pacificando o branco: Cosmologias do contato no norte–amazônico, São Paulo 2002, pp. 239-274.
Bal, M. (2002). Travelling Concepts in the Humanities: A Rough Guide, London.
Barthes, R. (1984). Mythologies, New York.
Bateson, G. (1972). Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology. San Francisco.
Boesch, E. (1991). Boesch, Symbolic action theory and cultural psychology, Berlin-Heidelberg.
Bollettin, Paride (2007). Divenire meoatopdjui, guerriero, tra gli Xikrin del Bakaja, “Quaderni di Thule” VI, 2007, pp. 675-682.
___________ (2008). O meu lugar no mundo, “Imaginário” V.16, 2008, pp. 95-127.
___________ (2011). Identità in trasformazione, PhD Thesis, Università degli Studi di Siena, 2011.
___________ (2017). Daudzsugu Amazone: animisma un antropomorfisma satikðanâs, “Punctum”, 2017, http://www.punctummagazine.lv/.
Caiuby Novaes, S. (1993). Jogos de Espelhos, São Paulo, 1993.
Cohn, C. (2005). Relações de diferença no Brasil Central, PhD Thesis, Universidade de São Paulo, 2005.
Descola, Fhilippe (2001). Naturaleza y sociedad. Perspectivas antropológicas, siglo Mexico.
Deleuze, G. (1968). Différence et Répétition, Paris, 1968.
Ewart, E. (2015). Categories and Consequences in Amazonia, in P. Dresh and J. Scheele (Eds.), Legalism: Rules and Categories, Oxford, 2015, pp. 205-230.
Fausto, C. (2007). Feasting on people: eating animals and humans in Amazonia, “Current Anthropology” 48(4), 2007, pp. 497–530.
Gordon, C. (2006). Economia Selvagem: Ritual e Mercadoria entre os Índios Mebêngôkre-Xikrin, Rio de Janeiro/São Paulo 2006.
Gow, P. (1990). Could Sangama read? The origin of writing among the Piro of Eastern Peru, “History and Anthropology” 5, pp. 87–103.
Grotti, V. (2009). Un Corps en Mouvement: Parenté, “Diffusion de l’Influence” et Transformations Corporelles dans les Fêtes de Bière Tirio, Amazonie du Nord-est, “Journal de la Société des Américanistes”, 95(1), 2009, pp. 73-96.
Haboud, M. (2004). Quichua language vitality: An Ecuadorian perspective, “International Journal of the Sociology of Language” 167, 2004, pp. 69–82.
Ingold, T. (2007). Lines: a brief history, New York 2007.
_________ (2011). Being alive: Essays on movement, knowledge and description. London, 2011.
Kohn, E. (2007). How dogs dream: Amazonian natures and the politics of transspecies engagement, “American Ethnologist” 34(1), 2007, pp. 03-24.
______________ (2013). How forests think. Toward an anthropology beyond the human. Berkeley, 2013.
Kopenawa, D. y Albert, B. (2010). La Chute du Ciel: Paroles d’un Chaman Yanomami, Paris, 2010.
Lagrou, E. (2007). A fluidez da forma: Arte, alteridade e agência em uma sociedade amazônica (Kaxinawa, Acre), Rio de Janeiro, 2007.
Latour, B. (1996). Petite réflexion sur le culte moderne des dieux faîtiches, Paris 1996.
Lea, V. (2012). Riquezas Invisíveis de Pessoas Partíveis, São Paulo, 2012.
Lévi-Strauss. C (1952). Race et historie, Paris, 1952.
____________ (1964). Mythologiques I. Le cru et le cuit, Paris, 1964.
____________ (1967). Mythologiques II. Du miel aux cendre, Paris, 1967.
____________ (1968). Mythologiques III. L’homme nu, Paris, 1968.
____________ (1971). Mythologiques IV. L’homme nu, Paris, 1971.
Lévi-Strauss, C y Eribon, D. (1988). De Prés et de loin. Entretiens avec Didier Eribon. Paris, 1988.
Lima. T. (1996). O dois e seu mútiplo: Reflexões sobre o perspectivismo em uma cosmologia Tupi, “Mana” 2(2), 1996, pp. 21–47.
McCallum, C. (2001). Gender and sociality in Amazonia: how real people are made, Oxford, 2001.
Rival, L (2005). The attachment of the soul to the body among the Huaorani of Amazonian Ecuador, “Ethnos” 70(3), 2005, pp. 285-310.
Rubenstein, S. (2012). On the importance of visions among the Amazonian Shuar, “Current Anthropology” 53(1), 2012, pp. 39–79.
Stengers, I. (2010). Cosmopolitics I, Minneapolis, 2010.
Tsing. A. (2012). Unruly Edges: Mushrooms as Companion Species, “Environmental Humanities” 1, 2012, pp. 141–154.
Turner, T. (1995). Social Body and Embodied Subject: The production of bodies, actors and society among the Kayapo, “Cultural Anthropology” 10(2), 1995, pp. 143-170.
_________ (2009). The Crisis of Late Structuralism. Perspectivism and Animism: Rethinking Culture, Nature, Spirit, and Bodiliness, “Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America” 7 (1), 2009, pp. 03-42.
Uzendoski, M. (2012). Beyond orality: Textuality, territory, and ontology among Amazonian peoples. “Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory” 2(1), 2012, pp. 55-80.
Vilaça, A. (2005). Chronically Unstable Bodies: Reflections on Amazonian Corporealities, “Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute” 11 (3), 2005, pp. 445–464.
Viveiros de Castro, E. (2002a). O nativo relativo, “Mana” 8(1), 2002a, pp. 115–144.
__________ (2002b). A inconstância da alma selvagem e outros ensaios de antropologia. São Paulo 2002b.
__________ (2004). Perspectival anthropology and the method of controlled equivocation. Keynote address to the 2004 Meeting of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America, Miami, 2004.
__________ (2011). Zeno and the art of anthropology, “Common Knowledge”, 17(1), pp. 128-145.
Wagner, R. (1981). The Invention of Culture, Chicago, 1981.