Hunters and Gatherers in the Modern World

by Schweitzer, Peter P.; Biesele, Megan; Hitchcock, Robert K.

• ISBN13: 9781571811028
• ISBN10: 1571811028
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-09-01
• Publisher: Berghahn Books

Summary

In an age of heightened awareness of the threat that western industrialized societies pose to the environment, hunters and gatherers attract particularly strong interest because they occupy the ecological niches that are constantly eroded. Despite the denial of sovereignty, the world's more than 350 million indigenous peoples continue to assert aboriginal title to significant portions of the world's remaining bio-diversity. As a result, conflicts between tribal peoples and nation states are on the increase. Today, many of the societies that gave the field of anthropology its empirical foundations and unique global vision of a diverse and evolving humanity are being destroyed as a result of national economic, political, and military policies. Although quite a sizable body of literature exists on the living conditions of the hunters and gatherers, this volume is unique in that it represents the first extensive east-west scholarly exchange in anthropology since the demise of the USSR. Moreover, it also offers new perspectives from indigenous communities and scholars in an exchange that be termed "south-north" as opposed to " north-north," denoting the predominance of northern Europe and North America in scholarly debate. The main focus of this volume is on the internal dynamics and political strategies of hunting and gathering societies in areas of self-determination and self-representation. More specifically, it examines areas such as warfare and conflict resolution, resistance, identity and the state, demography and ecology, gender and representation, and world view and religion. It raises a large number of major issues of common concerns and therefore makes important reading for all those interested in human rights issues, ethnic conflict, grassroots development and community organization, and environmental topics. Megan Bieseleis President, School of Expressive Culture, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas. She helped found the Kalahari Peoples Fund in 1973 and currently serves as its Coordinator. Robert H. Hitchcockis an Associate Professor of Anthropology and Chair of the Anthropology Department, as well as the coordinator of African Studies, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He is involved in research and development project monitoring, evacuation, and implementation, primarily in southern and eastern Africa and North America. Peter P. Schweitzeris Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Lecturer at the Institute of Ethnology, Cultural, and Social Anthropology, University of Vienna.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
Introduction	p. 1
Silence and Other Misunderstandings: Russian Anthropology, Western Hunter-Gatherer Debates, and Siberian Peoples	p. 29
Warfare and Conflict Resolution
Visions of Conflict, Conflicts of Vision among Contemporary Dene Tha	p. 55
Warfare among the Hunters and Fishermen of Western Siberia	p. 77
Homicide and Aggression among the Agta of Eastern Luzon, the Philippines, 1910-1985	p. 94
Conflict Management in a Modern Inuit Community	p. 110
Wars and Chiefs among the Samoyeds and Ugrians of Western Siberia	p. 125
Ritual Violence among the Peoples of Northeastern Siberia	p. 150
Patterns of War and Peace among Complex Hunter-Gatherers: The Case of the Northwest Coast of North America
Resistance, Identity, and the State
The Concept of an International Ethnoecological Refuge	p. 183
Aboriginal Responses to Mining in Australia: Economic Aspirations, Cultural Revival, and the Politics of Indigenous Protest	p. 192
Political Movement, Legal Reformation, and Transformation of Ainu Identity	p. 206
Tracking the "Wild Tungus" in Taimyr: Identity, Ecology, and Mobile Economies in Arctic Siberia	p. 223
Marginality with a Difference, or How the Huaorani Preserve Their Sharing Relations and Naturalize Outside Powers	p. 244
Ecology, Demography, and Market Issues
"Interest in the Present" in the Nationwide Monetary Economy: The Case of Mbuti Hunters in Zaire	p. 263
Dynamics of Adaptation to Market Economy among the Ayoreode of Northwest Paraguay	p. 275
Can Hunter-Gatherers Live in Tropical Rain Forests? The Pleistocene Island Melanesian Evidence	p. 287
The Ju/'hoansi San under Two States: Impacts of the South West African Administration and the Government of the Republic of Namibia	p. 305
Russia's Northern Indigenous Peoples: Are They Dying Out?	p. 327
Gender and Representation
Gender Role Transformation among Australian Aborigines	p. 343
Names That Escape the State: Hai//om Naming Practices versus Domination and Isolation	p. 361
Central African Government's and International NGOs' Perceptions of Baka Pygmy Development	p. 380
The Role of Women in Mansi Society	p. 391
Peacemaking Ideology in a Headhunting Society: Hudhud, Women's Epic of the Ifugao	p. 399
World-View and Religious Determination
Painting as Politics: Exposing Historical Processes in Hunter-Gatherer Rock Art	p. 413
Gifts from the Immortal Ancestors: Consmology and Ideology of Jahai Sharing	p. 427
Time in the Traditional World-View of the Kets: Materials on the Bear Cult	p. 455
Lexicon as a Source for Understanding Sel'kup Knowledge of Religion	p. 460
Notes on Contributors	p. 475
A Note on the Spelling of Siberian Ethnonyms	p. 485
Index	p. 487
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