[news] How the Amazon's Indigenous People are Holding Back the 'Arc of Destruction'

[Mostly Water - "Canadian" and International alternative news feed]

By Daniel Howden | 11 August 2006

The uruku red lines painted on her cheeks change shape as she draws a sharp breath. Arms outstretched, she blows into the palms of her hands and lifts an invisible weight into the night sky. Katia Luisa Yawanawa is standing on an open ship's deck, thousands of miles upstream on the Amazon, where the great river divides into the black water of the Rio Negro and white water of the Solimoes.

Katia is offering a prayer called a Shuanka. It involves singing to the Yawanawans' ancestors for guidance and protection. Although only 26, Katia is among the most important members of her tribe. She is a wise woman, a xinaya, and the Yawanawan tribe's first female shaman.

  


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    [1]: http://mostlywater.org/node/9885

URL: http://mostlywater.org/node/9885