From Warclubs to Words

I REMEMBER GOING TO VISIT AN ABAN-
doned Kayap6 village site near Conceiqgo do Ara-
guaia, in July of last year. I was guided there by Bepto-
poop, a wise and respected shaman and tradition-knower
from Gorotire village and one of my most beloved men-
tors. The old village had been abandoned for 40 or 50
years, but Beptopoop, who had known the village as a
child, was able to show us medicinal roots and edible
tubers, fruits, and nuts that had been planted decades
earlier by his grandparents. After all those years the
forest still reflected the indigenous hands that had
molded it. The forest path, however, soon took us to the
other side of the old site. There we encountered, as far as
the eye could see, burned vegetation and gigantic charred
trees reduced to useless, bleak memorials of the rich and
productive forest where Beptopoop’s grandparents once
planted their yams, bananas, cotton, beans, squash, corn,
and pumpkin. Beptopoop exclaimed, waving his arms:
“Why do the white men burn all of this, destroying it
VOLUME XXIII. NO. I (MAY 1989)
all, and then not even plant anything to feed their chil-
dren? Do they not know that their children and their
children’s children must have food to eat? I am too old
to understand any of this!”‘
When I began my work with the Kayap6 Indians of
Brazil’s Pard state in 1977, they were already at odds
with ranchers and squatters invading their lands. 2 Dur-
ing my first months in the village of Gorotire I joined
150 warclub and spear wielding warriors in a raid to
expel workers from a ranch encroaching on the eastern
edge of their reserve. I met Paulinho Paiakan and his
cousin Kube-i during that raid. Paiakan was 22 years
old-strikingly handsome, articulate, and interested in
everything. Paiakan was the son of a famous chief, and,
like Kube-i, destined to be a chief himself. I was amazed
when he recognized that the instruction manual of the
power saw he took from the raided ranch-and carried
through nearly 50 miles of Amazon jungle-was in Eng-
lish. He had studied some English with the missionariesAMAZON
in Gorotire and knew how to read and write in his own
language as well as Portuguese.
As I translated the manual for the first power saw to
arrive in Kayap6 land that night so long ago, I realized
that, like it or not, I would be a strange, foreign force in
an unknown process of adaptation to rapidly changing
times. But I never imagined that twelve years later
Paiakan, Kube-i and I would be the defendants in a
celebrated case that galvanized Brazil’s environmental
and Indian rights movements, providing a focal point for
uniting the two major movements to preserve the human
and biological richness of the Amazon and the planet.
During the past decade I have coordinated a team of
more than 20 ethnobiologists researching Kayap6 knowl-
edge and use of medicinal plants, agriculture, soil classi-
fication and use, nutrient recycling systems, formation
of enriched planting soils, reforestation methods, natural
pesticides and fertilizers, animal behavior, genetic im-
provement of cultivated and semi-wild plants, fish and
wildlife management, and even astronomy.
We were each humbled by the detail and richness of
Kayap6 scientific knowledge. Native specialists who
have never been in a classroom in their lives guided
Ph.Ds in the development of new hypotheses to test or
expand existing Western scientific knowledge. The
Kayap6 Project has shown that traditional knowledge
offers some of the most promising options for confront-
ing the problems of sustained resource management in
the tropics.
In 1983, for the first time in Brazil’s history, four
Kayap6 specialists were invited, as scientists, to partici-
pate in the congress of the Brazilian Zoological Society.
Thus began a grass-roots ethnobiology movement which
led to the First International Congress of Ethnobiology
in Bel6m last July. Approximately 600 persons from 35
countries participated in a celebration of indigenous
knowledge and its importance for world survival.
T WAS IN THE FINAL DAYS OF ORGANIZING
the congress that the Brazilian government decided
to indict me under the Law of Foreigners, for “exercis-
ing activities of a political nature or becoming involved
either directly or indirectly in the public affairs of Bra-
zil.”‘ The charges were the result of a trip to Miami in
January 1988 by Paulinho Paiakan, Kube-i Kayap6 and
myself to participate in an international symposium on
“Wise Management of Tropical Forest” at Florida In-
ternational University. I delivered a scholarly paper on
Chanting to keep up their spirit, Indians take their case to the Brazilian Congress
Z 0
0indigenous management systems and chaired a sympo-
sium session on the practical application of scientific
research. I also translated for the Kayap6 chiefs as they
spoke to the general assembly.
The two Kayap6 leaders explained how indigenous
peoples preserve biological and ecological diversity
while utilizing the renewable resources available to them
in their Amazon homes. They also emphasized the
threats from outside forces that they face daily: mining
and mercury pollution, erosion, massive burning of the
rainforest, logging roads that penetrate deep into their
forests, and mega-projects such as the construction of
huge hydroelectric dams.
Specifically, they voiced concern about the Altamira-
Xingli dam complex which, if approved, would inundate
7.6 million hectares (nearly 16 million acres) of rich
river bottom land-almost all of which belongs to vari-
ous Indian groups. The $10.6 billion project, the world’s
largest, would displace eleven Indian nations, all of them
already reduced to a dangerously low number of indi-
viduals. Worse still would be the loss of environmental
knowledge that each group preserves. Since equivalent
ecosystems outside the Xingli river basin do not exist,
there would be no place for the Indians to go and no
reason to continue the rich oral lore about useful plants
and animals of that region. Thousands of years of accu-
mulated knowledge, from eleven very different folk sci-
entific systems, would be lost forever.
Members of the assembly urged Paiakan and Kube-i
to take their protests to the World Bank, a major funder
of the proposed dams. Representatives of the National
Wildlife Federation and the Environmental Defense
Fund offered to pay their expenses and organize the
visit; the Kayap6 accepted the invitation.
T HE CHIEFS’ EXHAUSTING BLITZ OF WASH-
ington during the first week of February 1988 took
them to four executive directors of the World Bank and
the Bank’s technical staff for Brazil. Although met with
defensive hostility by the technical staff, the directors
for the United States, Great Britain, Holland and West
Germany seemed genuinely shocked that the Bank’s
liberal policy on native peoples was not being respected.
That policy stipulates that native peoples to be affected
must be consulted and their decisions heeded for a proj-
ect to receive World Bank funding. Paiakan and Kube-i
assured the directors that neither they nor any indige-
nous leaders of the Xingdi had ever been consulted or in-
formed about the proposed dams. The U.S. director as-
sured the chiefs that he would continue to vote against
the “power sector loan” to Brazil destined for Xingli
dam construction. Other directors were less committal,
but all said they would investigate infringements of Bank
rules protecting native peoples and the natural diversity
upon which they depend.
Paiakan and Kube-i also met with State Department
and Treasury representatives, as well as members of
Palakan about to film proceedings at Brazil’s Congress
Congress. Congressman John Porter, chairman of the
Congressional Human Rights Caucus, listened carefully
as the two spoke of personal acquaintances from other
indigenous groups, such as the Parakand, Gavido and
Atrori-Waiami, who had all been expelled from their
lands without due compensation or guaranteed land
rights elsewhere. Everywhere the chiefs went they asked
which countries were financing disaster in the Amazon.
There were many red faces, but few straight answers.
E XHAUSTED AFTER THE HECTIC WEEK,
we went to relax in the small Kentucky town where
I was born and reared, and where my parents still live in
the family’s traditional farmhouse. Our short weekend
rest turned out to be some of the last tranquil moments
any of us would have for a long time.
Upon arriving in Brazil, we all faced repeated police
interrogation. We learned that while we were in Wash-
ington, a special Brazilian delegation was there to rene-
gotiate the very loans that Kube-i and Paiakan were
trying to stop. The government delegation claimed that
the loans were paralyzed because of our visit, which
“jeopardized Brazil’s economic relations,” thereby
“provoking an economic crisis in Brazil.” According to
the federal police, our actions “denigrated Brazil’s im-
age abroad.”
I was specifically charged with having “illegally
taken Indians out of the country.” Not only this, but it
seems I did so with premeditated malice to use the
Indians to denigrate and jeopardize Brazil. The Indians
had been granted permission to leave the country by the
National Indian Foundation (FUNAI), which is respon-
sible for its “wards.” Furthermore, since the Federal
Police control the nation’s borders, no one, especially a
foreigner, could have “illegally taken” anyone without
their consent and knowledge. Paiakan assumed respon-
VOLUME XXIII, NO. I (MAY 1989) 15AMAZON
sibility for all he had said in Washington and provided
news articles from Brazil that quoted him extensively.
Such explanations were to no avail. As the federal
police agent told me during my second interrogation:
“Someone had to be behind those Indians. They would
have never gone to Washington and said those things by
themselves.” That logic may well stand up in court,
since before the law Indians are considered “relatively
incapable” persons in the same category as minors and
the mentally deficient.
At the preliminary hearings on August 3, Paiakan
and I were amazed to learn that the only evidence against
us were clippings from Brazilian newspapers reporting
the Indians’ visit to Washington. Nevertheless, on Au-
gust 8, the district attorney for Bel6m, Paulo Meira,
formally charged me with having taken Paiakan and
Kube-i to Washington, where, through my translations, I
manipulated their testimonies with the “intention of
frustrating the execution of Brazil’s Energy Plan.” Much
to everyone’s surprise, the two Kayap6 chiefs were
charged as accomplices to my “crimes,” also under the
Law of Foreigners. In nearly 500 years of white-Indian
relations in Brazil, never before had Indians been prose-
cuted as foreigners in their native land.
Shocking as well was the allegation that “crimes”
committed outside Brazilian national territory could be
prosecuted by Brazilian courts. The Brazilian Legal
Society (OAB), the equivalent of the Bar Association,
lodged a formal protest. 4 Jos6 Carlos Castro, president
of the OAB’s influential Human Rights Commission
and our legal representative, declared the trial to be “a
politically motivated maneuver to silence the scientific
community and native leaders so as not to speak out
against mega-projects supported by the authoritarian
government.” Authoritarianism and secrecy, he said,
are the life-lines of such mega-projects as the Altamira-
Xingli Hydroelectric Complex.
The Human Rights Commission’s call for protest
was taken up by the Brazilian Anthropological Associa-
tion, the Brazilian Society for the Advancement of Sci-
ence, the International Society of Ethnobiology, Cul-
tural Survival, Survival International, Amnesty Interna-
tional and literally hundreds of non-governmental groups
concerned with conservation, Indian rights and human
rights. Thousands of irate letters were sent to President
Jos6 Sarney and petitions of support have been circu-
lated around the world.
E VEN WITH SCANT EVIDENCE AND SIGNIFI-
cant public opposition, the case continued on Oc-
tober 14 when Kube-i was summoned to give testimony.
Kube-i arrived at the federal courthouse in Bel6m ac-
companied by over 400 Kayap6 warriors. I watched
from the curtained French windows of the courthouse as
the warriors, painted black and red for war, bedecked
with colorful headdresses and armed with clubs and
spears, arrived in four buses. A group of non-Indian
Darrell Posey with the most famous Indian in Brazil:
Chief Rob-ni of the Kayap6
supporters surrounded them and together they stopped
traffic on one of Bel6m’s major avenues. Chiefs from all
sub-groups of the Kayap6 nation were present, including
those nearly 1,000 miles distant from each other and,
until then, at odds. One of the banners carried by the
non-Indian protesters read: “Kuben Axwere”‘–Kayap6
for “White Men Without Shame.”
Court employees were genuinely frightened and some
planned an emergency retreat. I saw several judges hide
in consternation behind curtains in the magistrates’ par-
lor. The special shock force of 35 riot-control police
lined up in front of the iron courthouse fence were soon
joined by 45 civil police scattered along the street and 15
federal police armed with automatic weapons within the
building and its grounds.
The Kayap6, however, as Paiakan would later say,
“used to defend themselves with warclubs and spears,
but today we defend ourselves with words, our heads,
and the press.” The Brazilian and foreign press were out
in force as the chiefs, over 30 of them in all, lined up to
shake the hands of each member of the shock squad
police. Then they moved to the center of the gathered
mass to begin their orations in the traditional Kayap6
manner with forceful gestures and strong, loud voices so
that anyone-even those who had never heard a word of
any Indian language-would know this was a protest.
The warriors surrounded the chiefs and began to
dance in a revolving circle as they sang songs of war and
victory. Warriors selected to defend the group were sent
to stand directly in front of the shock squad: 35 police
and 35 warriors formed an open corridor six feet wide.
Paiakan’s uncle, a respected war chief and orator, then
began to pace up and down the corridor, stopping in
front of each policeman to protest against the treatment
of Kube-i and Paiakan and the government’s disrespect
for Indian rights, lands and natural resources. It soon
REPORT ON THE AMERICAS f 16became clear why the chiefs had first peacefully greeted
each of the police: The gestures and words of the bow-
and-arrow-armed orator were very emphatic and could
have been interpreted as signs of intended violence.
As this was occurring, Paiakan unveiled a large map
he had acquired in Washington that detailed the nine
dams planned for the Xingli river basin. Such a map, he
explained, was considered a secret document in Brazil
and had never been seen by the Brazilian people. Paiakan
repeated the charges he and Kube-i had made in Wash-
ington. This time, their outrages were being reported by
journalists and filmed for broadcast around the world.
Inside the courthouse, Judge Ivan Velasco Nasci-
mento announced that he would not hear Kube-i’s testi-
mony if the Indian leader did not appear in “proper
dress.” Kube-i was wearing a brilliant red, green, and
yellow parrot feather headdress that symbolized his
family and his birthrights. His body and face were
painted in magnificent geometric designs made with
black paint from the genipap tree, prepared with hours
of loving care by his sister. His red and blue beaded
armbands and pearly mussel shell ornaments sparkled
against the black body paint.
To the Kayap6, Kube-i was dressed for the most
solemn of occasions. Judge Nascimento disagreed. He
reiterated his demand that Kube-i appear “in a respect-
able manner,” not “semi-nude and in costume.” Kube-
i refused. The judge gave Kube-i twenty minutes to
reconsider, warning that if he did not change his mind,
his actions would be interpreted as contempt. Kube-i
refused once and for all, and announced it to the as-
sembled press.
Our lawyer protested that the newly approved Brazil-
ian constitution prohibits racism and considers the de-
nial of minority rights a crime. The judge, echoed by the
district attorney, replied that “Indians must become ac-
culturated,” and ordered psychological, psychiatric and
anthropological tests to determine the extent to which
the Indians were aware of their complicity in the
“crimes” committed.
The Indian warriors, still dancing and singing in the
hot Amazonian sun outside, did not take the judge and
prosecutor’s decisions lightly. After a meeting of lead-
ers, a war chief was selected to go with his bow and
arrows to a point squarely in the front of the heavily
guarded courthouse gate. With careful aim and absolute
confidence he shot three arrows into the ancient mango
tree that shaded the entrance. “That,” explained Chief
Rob-ni, “is the sign of our certainty of victory.”‘
T HE FOLLOWING DAY, THE PROTEST WAS
headline news in Brazil and around the world. Bra-
To the Kayap6, Kube-i was dressed for the most solemn of occasions. The judge demanded “proper dress.”
Er
a:
U-
IL
w
I-
WAMAZON
zilian television carried the story for days. If in Wash-
ington the Kayap6 had “denigrated the image of Bra-
zil,” the government’s insistence on prosecuting their
“crimes” did so much more effectively.
A few days later, our lawyer, Jos6 Carlos Castro,
filed formal charges against Judge Nascimento under
Article 5 of the Brazilian constitution that prohibits ra-
cial discrimination. 6 Claiming that officials in Beldm
were “suspected of incompetence to judge the case,”
Castro requested that it be transferred to Brasilia. The
judge responded by formally charging Castro with defa-
mation, thereby provoking yet another legal case.
Despite building pressure, in December the Supreme
Court refused to suspend the case. Two requests for
habeas corpus were filed, one arguing that the Indians
should be removed from the case, the second calling for
its total closure. On February 12, the Court finally dis-
missed the charges against Paiakan, Kube-i and myself,
citing “incompetence” in the application of the Law of
Foreigners to Indians. Our suit against the judge and
prosecutor is still pending and, along with most anthro-
pologists, I am prohibited from travelling to Indian a-
reas.
International encounter at Altamira: led by Indians
Most local observers continue to feel that the case
was intended to keep scientists from opposing mega-
projects and to weaken indigenous leadership. It back-
fired horrendously on both counts. The scientific com-
munity rallied firmly, and important alliances between
human and Indian rights groups, on the one hand, and
environmentalists, on the other, have emerged.
The collaboration of these two movements around
our case led to “The First Encounter of Native Peoples
in the Xingd,” which took place February 20-25 in the
tiny Amazon town of Altamira, the center of the pro-
posed dam project. About 600 indigenous leaders from
throughout the Americas participated. Non-Indian lead-
ers met in parallel sessions to consolidate their network
and to give solidarity to the Indians. Together, they drew
up “A Unified Strategy for the Preservation of the
Amazon and its Peoples” to guide the new alliance of
native peoples and conservationists. Brazil, despite the
efforts of its government and justice department, is sud-
denly the center of an indigenous-led movement to pre-
serve the rapidly disappearing bio-, eco-, and ethno-
diversity of the Amazon-and of the planet.
A S A SCIENTIST, OBSERVER AND FRIEND,
I watched the Kayap6 buy their first airplane to
bring elders together from distant villages to re-establish
nearly lost rituals; the arrival of the road and the first
trucks; the installment of a satellite antenna in the vil-
lage plaza; the arrival of the first baby buggy to wheel
about toddlers painted head-to-toe in black and red.
I also watched thousands of gold miners invade In-
dian lands, and I followed the sharp rise in malaria and
other exotic diseases that resulted. I have seen the burn-
ing of the Amazon forest by encroaching ranches and
farms obscure the sun throughout the entire day. I have
seen the traditional diet of natural fruits, nuts, vegetables
and game give way to the much less nutritious beans,
rice, manioc and coffee. I watched truckload after truck-
load of huge mahogany logs shipped out in clouds of
Amazon dust. And I have seen village chiefs opening
their bank accounts-in Pierre Cardin suits no less-in
the nearest frontier town.
Anthropologists tend to be cultural conserva-
tives-purists perhaps: We flinch when we see “our
people” lose those distinctive features that made us
want to go to the Amazon in the first place. With most of
the changes, I had to swallow hard and bite my lip. But I
tried to not be a paternalistic white man who knows
what is best for Indians. I tried to listen more than talk,
and to help create the scientific, social and political
space for Indians themselves to speak and be heard.
As we await the final outcome of the various legal
cases generated by this process, people constantly ask,
“Was it all worth it?” On this one, I am a fatalist: It had
to happen. I simply happened to be in the right place at
the right time to have the privilege of playing a role in
this deadly serious struggle.
REFERENCES
From Warclubs to Words
1. Marlise Simons of The New York Times was with us and
Beptopoop’s observation was subsequently quoted in the Times’
Oct. 8, 1988 editorial, whose impact on world opinion against
destruction of the Amazon shook Brazil.
2. The Kayap6, numbering about 8,500, are one of the larger
tribes of the Amazon.
3. These ambiguous laws are considered to be relics of the
twenty-year military rule that theoretically ended in 1984, even
though they have not been struck down under the newly approved
Brazilian Constitution. Under the Penal Code, they call for one to
three years imprisonment and expulsion from the country.
4. Reported in O Globo (Rio de Janeiro), Aug. 16, 1988.
5. Rob-ni, known in Brazil as Raoni, was one of the founders of
the national Indian movement. He gained fame in the early 1980s
for pulling the ears of the interior minister on national television.
6. Anthropological and legal experts consulted agreed that the
judge’s statements were not only racist but constituted a call for
cultural genocide. Interestingly, under the constitution, racism is
considered a crime for which the accused can be jailed without
bond if sufficient evidence is presented. Given that the witnesses
were official representatives of OAB and the foreign press, it will
be interesting to see the outcome of this case when it is eventually
heard. It is a precedent case under the new constitution and is
attracting great attention. Our lawyer also filed a formal protest
against the administration of psychological, psychiatric and anthro-
pological tests to the Indians. From a procedural standpoint, if such
tests were to be considered necessary, they should be requested by
the defense, not the prosecution. Furthermore, he stated, such tests
are simply not feasible since “acculturation” has never been le-
gally defined.