LIFE OF THE AWAJUN TRIBE
Sunday, 26 July 2015 | Kumar Chellappan | in Agenda
UPRIVER
Author: Michael Brown
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Rs1,141
Awajun is an indigenous tribal group from the Amazonian frontier in Peru. KUMAR CHELLAPPAN tries to draw a parallel between them and the tribals in India, as is evident in this book
Lima, capital city of Peru, is approximately 17,000 km from New Delhi by air. My interest in Peru began in 1986 after watching the national football team of the country (that was what the All India Football Federation claimed) playing some matches in the Nehru Cup International Invitation Football Championship held at Trivandrum. Ashok Ghosh, the then football boss of India told sports reporters in Trivandrum that he was bringing in Peru so that soccer lovers would get a chance to watch the famous Latin American style “live” and in person. But the three games played by the Peruvians were nowhere near our expectations. More than kicking the football, the Peruvians were kicking and hitting their opponents!
What was interesting was that most of the players resembled Indians and some of them had a distinct Malayalee look. Satish Chandran, ace football commentator of All India Radio told me during a post match press meet that some of the Peruvian players looked like the folks one comes across in Trivandrum’s Chala vegetable market. “We don’t know for sure. Maybe Ashok Ghosh and company had lined up some of the head load workers from Chala market as Latin American players”, he said half jokingly and half seriously.
Three decades later when I read Upriver: The turbulent life and times of An Amzonian People authored by anthropologist Michael Brown, the 1986 Nehru Cup Championship, Ashok Ghosh, the Peruvian football team and Satish Chandran came back to my mind. Upriver is about the 50,000 strong Awajun, an indigenous tribal group in the Amazonian frontier in Peru. Even if one takes Satish Chandran’s comments on Peruvians in a lighter vein, the story of Awajun (pronounced as Awahoon) is no different from that of many myriad tribals and indigenous people in India.
More than the results of the two-phase anthropological research held by Brown (1976-1978 and 1980-2012) among the Awajun, what is unique is the similarities these tribals in Peru share with their counterparts in India. Suppression and oppression of the Awajun by the city folks who come to the Amazonian region for plundering the forest wealth and rubber cultivation are no different from the sufferings of the tribals in India at the hands of city dwellers who colonise the tribal territories for monetary benefits.
Whether it be in Peru or India, the evangelists subjugated and destroyed the tribals and their culture under the pretext of introducing civilisation among them. Brown’s interest in Awajun was accidental as his original plan was “to study about Lamistas, native people whose widespread population was centred in the Upper Amazonian town of Lamas in Peru”.
His association with Lamistas led him to take interest in Quechua, a language spoken by the descendants of the Incas. The passion to study more about Quechua language took him to Huascayacu, the place colonised by the Awajun, where he was surprised by their culture, rituals and traditions. An Awajun by name Tomas, who has been trained in bilingual education by American missionaries, and who has been proselytising the community, helped Brown to learn the language as well as the Awajun life.
What strikes an Indian reader is the respect the Awajun has for the rainforests. Though they survive by hunting rabbits, various birds and other small animals, they never kill deers or other big animals which are abundant in the forest. “A curious feature of the Awajun food preference was that two of the largest rainforest mammals, the deer and the tapir, were customarily considered taboo. “Deers were said to be one of the forms taken by human souls after death,” writes Brown. Compare this with the devotion shown by tribals in India towards the sacred groves. For our “uneducated, uncivilised” tribal friends, the groves are abodes of village Gods who ensure them safety and protection from diseases and devils. The reality is that whether it be the rainforests in Peru or the sacred groves in South India, they are all safe repositories of the region’s biodiversity.
Brown has some real life personal anecdotes to mention about his interaction with the Awajuns. When they were shown old issues of National Geographic featuring the Amazonian people living in the Xingu region of Brazil, the Awajuns were taken aback by the nude pictures of their counterparts. “The concept of people living virtually naked scandalised all who examined the magazine. For days afterward, clusters of adolescent boys would slink up to my door after dark and whisper conspiratorially, ‘brother, let’s see the naked women’. The conversations inspired by the revealing photographs improved my anatomical vocabulary in Awajun,” reminiscences Brown of his 1976 to 1978 days in Awajun territory.
The evangelical sects who were the first to reach the Awajun territory had taught them to be suspicious of outsiders. They were told by the missionaries that the purpose behind those coming to study Awajun culture were something else — secret mineral prospecting or the pursuit of sexual conquests based on the natural ascendancy of White men over native women.
Brown’s findings about the social architecture of Awajun families could be of interest to the Dravidian politicians of Tamil Nadu. The Awajuns follow polygamy without any fuss. “The underlying architecture of Awajun families proved to be a method of classifying kin known as Dravidian. Named after a pattern found in parts of South Asia, Dravidian systems are common throughout the world,” writes Brown in what could be music to the ears of DMK leader M Karuanidhi and his sidekick K Veeramani who swear by Dravidians for everything.
The Awajun schoolteachers, appointed by the Government come from distant communities leaving behind their wives. They soon establish new marriages in their new villages. Take a trip to Wynadu or Attappadi, the tribal hamlets in Kerala and one will see hundreds of such instances.Iwanch, Spanish for devil, has its parallel among tribals in Palakkadu. Iwanch is a giant sized humanoids entirely covered with dark hair and who could present themselves as deer, owls or morpho butterflies. They are known to harass people outdoors at night, especially in the forest. Iwanch is the same as that of Odiyans, an entity which even now evokes nightmares in Palakkadu villages in Kerala.
What is striking about Brown’s recounting of his Awahun days are the similar approaches followed by the Christian missionaries to destroy the culture and rituals of the tribals in Peru as well as in India. It is the same everywhere in the world.Take a trip Upriver; it has a lot even for those not familiar with anthropology. Studies on Indian tribals too would bring out stories of cruelties perpetrated by the coterie of evangelists and contractors with ulterior motives.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/sunday-edition/agenda/books/life-of-the-awajun-tribe.html