Manual Indigenista Mateiro

Abstract

The “non-contact” methodology, developed and implemented by Brazilian indigenists in the mid 80s, made the country an important technical reference in Latin America and the rest of the world regarding the development of methods for monitoring and protecting the isolated indigenous groups inhabiting the Amazon forest and their territories. This methodology aims to guarantee to groups in isolation a right to their indigenous and original territories whilst respecting their self-determination to refuse making contact and their right to remain in isolation with no permanent or periodic contact with non-indigenous people – the so called “surrounding society” – or even other indigenous groups. Because of this methodology, nearly 30 isolated indigenous groups are recognized by the Brazilian government and can be monitored and protected without being contacted. The teams locate and supervise these groups through the remains they leave in the forests. The methods to do this were developed in the Amazonian forest in a way that the identified remains are analyzed and interpreted in a very specific ecological context. Generally, they are traces of the use and handling of raw vegetable materials; these can be observed in the trunks of trees or in different concentrations of certain species in the forest. The indigenous knowledge, informed by concrete experiences of living with/in the forest and its inhabitants, is the fundamental principle of the non-contact methodology. It contains the expertise and science of the mateiros (those who are responsible for field works) and the indigenous people, who have always acted as guides to expeditions and have been a part of the field teams of indigenist institutions. In acknowledgement of the silenced presence of plants, indigenous people and mateiros, this dissertation aims to systematize their vast empirical knowledge (parabotanic) dispersed in many works and in a dialog with the academic and scientific knowledge in order to formulate a specific botanical knowledge. This would be applied to the monitoring and protection of the isolated indigenous territories by the professionals engaged in field activities in the indigenous Amazon. Lastly, this work will not shy away from taking position in the face of the anti-indigenous and anti-indigenist policies that have been the mark of the Brazilian government for a long time and which took genocidal connotations from 2019, threatening greatly the existence of the indigenous lands and groups which need it for their livelihoods.