1. The Yanomamo
However, "Yanomamo: The Fierce People" is taken as justification by politicians and businessmen, particularly gold miners, who come to exploit the land inhabited by the tribe. Therefore, perhaps, unconsciously Changon might have had a political effect on this tribe through publishing this book. .
Why is this tribe so fierce? Are there any explanations to such violent behavior? "The Yanomamo themselves regard fights over women as the primary causes of their wars." Chagnon reported data that states that killers among the Yanomamo people reproduce more than non-killers. This means that Chagnon is a sociobiologist, or someone who believes that human behavior and culture are the result of natural selection. Many anthropologists consider this position wrong and racist. In some ways, I would have to agree with them. If the behavior of people in this tribe is caused by their genes, it means that even if we bring a newborn Yanomamo child into our society and raise it in our ways he (if it is a male) will have a tendency to murder. In my opinion, it is not true. But, in fact, Chagnon makes an attempt to give other reasons for the Yanomamo's chronic warfare such as lack of protein supply. However, when he suggested it to the men of the tribe, their response was: "Even though we like meat, we like women a whole lot more!" Nevertheless, I believe that there have to be other explanations for their culture and behavior other than their genes. And, perhaps, Chagnon should have worked more on figuring it out.
On the other hand the author did not seem hateful or negative towards the tribe himself. Chagnon often described the friendships that he made with some of the Yanomamo people. In many controversial moments of the book he was on their side. For example, in the situation when they were practically harassed and threatened by a missionary named Pete who tried to convert them into Christianity by means of insulting and embarrassing them, he encouraged the Yanomamo to maintain their religious beliefs and not be intimidated by the missionary's threats.
This is a look into the lives of the Yanomamo Indians of Brazil and Venezuela. ... There is also mentioning of how the government treated the Yanomamo decades ago some of the history of the Yanomamo Indians. ... Chagnon has also formed a group called the Yanomamo Survival Fund. ... During Chagnon's 50 months of fieldwork on the Yanomamo Indians, all of it was done with the Yanomamo in Venezuela except of one brief period in 1967. ... Yanomamo village population size and land area vary. ...
The Yanomamos bulk of food comes from the garden (manioc, maize, and bananas). ... Among the Yanomamo, men have difficulty finding women because they are in short supply. ... The Yanomamo live in only a ranked society, which is decidedly masculine because "men are more valuable than women". ... Political organization among the Yanomamo is carried out in feasts. ... Some Yanomamo even play with their rich language and work at being what we might call literary or learned....
The Yanomamo live in the tropical rainforests of Brazil and Venezuela. ... (Smoles 1976:7) The Yanomamo as a culture has found a way to adapt to their environment. ... Like the Yanomamo, the Masaai also have a sort of adapting ritual (Masaai.com). ... This proves that the Yanomamo have more than one way in which marriage is practiced. ... In comparison to the Yanomamo, they do...
The Yanomamo has a unique family organization. ... However, when the Yanomamo becomes ten years old, one thirds of them live in a family with their parents, and one tenth of them are in such family when they comes to be twenty years old. This means that most marriageable aged Yanomamo men don't have a living father, who must die from attacks of raiders or accidents. In Yanomamo society, marriages are arranged by a father, but, in the case of absence of a father, they are arranged by elder men of their kinship or elder male friends. The Yanomamo usually marry more than one wife as ...
Yanomamo women are treated as materialistic objects and promised by their father or brother to a Yanomamo man in return for reciprocity. ... The trades are often practiced in the Yanomamo culture. Polygamy is also a part of the Yanomamo culture. Yanomamo women are kept in the male's possession. ... Adultery is inexcusable to the Yanomamo. ...
Lee, Richard B., 1993, The Dobe Ju/hoansi. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, (second edition). Bushman: a member of a group of short-statured peoples of southern Africa who traditionally live by hunting and foraging. While the termbushman? has come to be known as both racist and sexist,...
The material that promotes the film in an academic and independent film catalog, BuyIndies.com, describes the process of the ritual by saying: "The shaman plays a vital role in Yanomamo society, for it is he who calls, commands, and often is possessed by spirits, or hekura. ...
The essential difference in these two theories is what drives a society towards its advancements. Marx believed that the inequality between the haves and have-nots would lead to a revolt from the proletariat. (The proletariat are easily described as the workers who are employed by the capitalists.) ...