Our Philosophy and Basic Information

Mission:

The iCross-Cultural Project is a cultural anthropology course-based project meant to raise critical consciousness about the rich cultural diversity in our indigenous world. Being totally aware of the limitations of being outsiders, we are a group of multidisciplinary undergraduate students who believe in cross-cultural sensitivity and participatory agency aimed at disseminating information about indigenous realities as accurately as possible.


Vision:

The iCross-Cultural Citizen Project's vision is to create an online cross-cultural space for students,professionals,and youth to learn and exchange cross-culturally sensitive information about contemporary indigenous experiences. From that outsider student's perspective, we will try to theoretically explore possible collaborative solutions to problems that affect the indigenous populations of our planet. Finally, we hope for the future creation of space where indigenous youth can share their experiences and their realities with us for real mutual collaboration to take place.


Values:

- We value the maximization of benefits to indigenous peoples and other vulnerable populations in the world.
- We value the respect for persons all over the world.
- We value the equal treatment of people, and we are against the exploitation of vulnerable groups around the world.
- We value collaborative cross-cultural learning and critical thinking.


Background Information:

The awa are an endangered indigenous group of people who have little to no contact with the modern world. There are currently 350 members, 100 of which have had no contact with the outside world whatsoever. They faced significant hardship during the 19th century, when settlers came in and cleared most of the forest they live in. This caused them to move to government-established settlements. Even after they left their home behind, they were still able to maintain their way of life, and pass on their cultural values.


Geographic Location:

The awa are located in the eastern portion of the amazon rainforest. With the surplus of wildlife and food available to them, the awa get most of their food from hunting. Although their is so much food, the awa insist on hunting some animals only during certain times of the year. Other animals, such as the capybara and the harpy eagle are taboo to eat, and therefore will not be eaten. The awa try to maintain the survival of the rainforest, just as they are trying to maintain the survival of their people.

Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Population and their Way of Living



As of today there is around 240 tribes in Brazil with approximately 900,000 people; which equals 0.4% of the Brazilian's population.  The Awa tribe consists of just 350 people out of the almost thousand indigenous in the Brazilian amazon. They are nomadic hunter-gatherers, which means that they obtain most of their foods form wild animals and plants. The Awa tribe lives in small family groups and they only keep few possessions with them, which allows them to move more faster through the forest. Also these groups have a highly detailed mental map of their surroundings, which allows them to know where are the best places for hunting and for settling their shelters. When moving from one part of the amazon to another, the Awa groups have the ability to built shelters from tree saplings and palm leaves in a few hours. This tribe is also very well known because they have many pets. They have boars, vultures, coatis, capuchins, howler monkeys, and pigs. Some of these wild animals get to share the hammocks with the people. When the tribe finds a baby animal, they take care of it until they consider that he or she is ready to go back to the amazon and take care or herself or himself. In the Awa tribes many families have more pets than children in their shelters.


Survival International
            Brazilian Tribes. Electronic document,
            http://www.survivalinternational.org/tribes/brazilian, accessed March 25, 2015 

Posted by at

1 comment:

  1. UnknownApril 6, 2015 at 4:36 AM

    The Awa tribe is such a small one, which is surviving throughout the years. It is in fact one of the smallest tribes out in the amazon. They hunt in order to be able to survive, they hunt wild animals and plants in order to obtain food and not suffer hunger. Just like our society here in the United States, they also adapt to their surroundings and find a way to make it work. For us it is easy to get food, we just go to the store and get what ever we need. The same is for the tribes in the amazon, when they need food, they go and hunt and they gather what they need in order to survive. Something that we do not have in common is the amount of possessions we have, the Awa tribe has few possessions, which allows them move from parts of the amazon to another more easily. For us, in the contrary to move from one part of the city to another, it would take a moving truck or more than one. What gets my attention the most about this Awa tribe is the amount of pets that they possess. They may have more pets in some families then the amount of children they have. In our society in a family of five or six there might be one or two pets only. I really like how much they care about their wild animals and how they take care of them.

    The way I can relate myself to the Awa's way of living is the moving from place to place and keeping pets also. ( not from the amazon) I was born in a small city called Kherson, in Ukraine(about 300,000 people). I have three siblings, two older brothers and an older sister. I lived in Kherson for six years, I spent time in the city during the school year and over the summer I always was at the farm with my grandparents. It was my favorite part of the year because I got to spend time with all the animals they had. Like horses, caws, pigs, dogs, chickens, cats , and they even kept fishes in an mini aquarium that I did not understand at that point why they were disappearing all the time and replaced all the time. That was weird to me back then! After the wonderful six years lived in Kherson, just like the Awa people, my family and I packed just what was essential and we moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina. I was young so I do not even remember what they packed, but I know that they could not take more than just a suitcase by children. So I was raised in a very big city, Buenos Aires consists approximately of 3 million people. To wrap it up, one more time after moving for first time from Kherson; after 12 years living in Buenos Aires, my family did it again. At 17 moved again to Florida, taking just a few things with us. This time I do remember what I packed, and it was a very hard thing to do because at this age I had so many things i wanted to take but I could only pack two giant suitcases. This time the light packing was not what I relate my self to the Awa way of living, but the process of adaptation to a new way of living in another remote place.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)