The Indigenous Peoples’ Right to live in Voluntary Isolation
In a world characterized by information, there are issues that have been made so invisible that the great majority of people do not know that they exist. This is the (Read More)
Bulletin Issue 87 – October 2004
THE FOCUS OF THIS ISSUE: INDIGENOUS PEOPLES IN VOLUNTARY ISOLATION
Many people are unaware that there are still indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation –both contacted and uncontacted- particularly in the tropics. People are also largely unaware about the impacts resulting from forced or free contacts of these peoples with the outside world. As a means of generating awareness and support to their plight, we have focused this entire bulletin on this issue, in collaboration with the Forest Peoples Programme and with other organizations and individuals working to protect these peoples’ rights.
OUR VIEWPOINT
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After the Rubber Boom
When the first ‘conquistadores’ travelled down the Amazon in the 16th century, they found populous settlements, hierarchical chiefdoms and complex agricultural systems all along the main river. The ‘Indians’, they (Read More)
REGIONAL CASES
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Cameroon: Does isolation still protect forest communities?
Indigenous Baka number 30-40,000 and live in the southern and southeastern areas of Cameroon. They are associated with, among other local communities the Bagando Bakwele, Knonbemebe, Vonvo, Zime and Dabjui (Read More)
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Using avoidance to maintain autonomy. The Mbendjele Yaka in Northern Congo-Brazzaville
The Mbendjele Yaka “Pygmies” live in northern Congo-Brazzaville. Mbendjele claim shared ancestry with other forest hunter-gatherer groups in the region such as the Baka, Mikaya, Luma or Gyeli. The Mbendjele (Read More)
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Argentina: The silent genocide of the Mbya Guarani
The Mbya Guarani are an ancient forest people with their roots in the Amazon. In Misiones, a province in the northeast of Argentina, they have 74 communities and a total (Read More)
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Brazil: Indigenous peoples in isolation and policies to defend and protect them
In the first place, it is important to clearly define what we are talking about when we refer to peoples or populations in “voluntary isolation.” This term and similar ones (Read More)
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Colombia: The Nukak, the last contacted nomadic people
The Nukak are a nomadic people from the Colombian Amazon, officially contacted in 1988. The present population is estimated at 390 people, distributed among 13 local groups, located in the (Read More)
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Ecuador: The Huaorani People of the Amazonia, self-isolation and forced contact
Huaorani culture and society is shaped by their will to self-isolation. Very little is known about their past, except that they have for centuries constituted nomadic and autarkic enclaves fiercely (Read More)
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Paraguay: The last Ayoreo in voluntary isolation
The Ayoreo live in a zone of their ancestral territory called Amotocodie. Modern maps show it as an extensive area of virgin forest with the geographic coordinates 21º 07’ S (Read More)
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Peru: Policy development for indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation
In 1990, the Peruvian state established the Kugapakori/Nahua Reserve to protect the lives, rights and territories of indigenous peoples in South East Peru avoiding, or strictly limiting their contact with (Read More)
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India: Wave of poaching and exploitation hits isolated tribes
Outsiders are invading the reserve of the isolated Jarawa tribe in the Andaman Islands, India, and stealing the game on which they depend for food. There are also increasing reports (Read More)
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Indonesia: The Baduy people of western Java – living tradition
In the Banten region of western Java, Indonesia, exists a small-scale indigenous community that has to a large extent been able to avoid the advancement of globalization, modern technology and (Read More)
IMPOSED CONTACTS
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‘La Fumee du Metal’: The health impacts of contact *
The 21,000 Yanomami who live in some 360 widely scattered settlements in the forested mountains and hills between Venezuela and Brazil were largely uncontacted by westerners until the middle of (Read More)
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Central Africa: Nowhere to go; land loss and cultural degradation. The Twa of the Great Lakes
The indigenous Twa ‘Pygmy’ people of the Great Lakes region of central Africa are originally a mountain-dwelling hunter-gatherer people, inhabiting the high altitude forests around Lakes Kivu, Albert and Tanganyika (Read More)
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India: Settling Down and Out; the sedentarisation of the Malapantaram in Kerala
The Malapantaram are a nomadic community numbering about 2000 people who live in the high forests of the Ghat Mountains of south India. Early writers described them as “wild jungle (Read More)
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First Contact in Papua New Guinea: A clash of world views
When Australians took control, at the end of the first world war, of the German colony of New Guinea, under a mandate from the League of Nations to protect the (Read More)