Native Christians: Modes and Effects of Christianity Among Indigenous Peoples of the Americas (Vitality of Indigenous Religions Series)

267 Pages·2009·4.34 MB·English

by  Aparecida Vilaca

Native ChristiaNs
Native Christians reflects on the modes and effects of Christianity among indigenous
peoples of the Americas drawing on comparative analysis of ethnographic and
historical cases. Christianity in this region has been part of the process of conquest
and domination, through the association usually made between civilizing and
converting. While Catholic missions have emphasized the ‘civilizing’ process,
teaching the Indians the skills which they were expected to exercise within the
context of a new societal model, the Protestants have centered their work on
promoting a deep internal change, or ‘conversion’, based on the recognition of
God’s existence.
Various ethnologists and scholars of indigenous societies have focused their
interest on understanding the nature of the transformations produced by the
adoption of Christianity. The contributors in this volume take native thought as the
starting point, looking at the need to relativize these transformations. Each author
examines different ethnographic cases throughout the Americas, both historical
and contemporary, enabling the reader to understand the indigenous points of view
in the processes of adoption and transformation of new practices, objects, ideas
and values.
VITALITY OF INDIGENOUS RELIGIONS
Series Editors
Graham Harvey, Open University, UK
Lawrence Martin, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, USA
Tabona Shoko, of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe
Ashgate’s Vitality of Indigenous Religions series offers an exciting new cluster
of research monographs, drawing together volumes from leading international
scholars across a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. Indigenous religions
are vital and empowering for many thousands of indigenous peoples globally, and
dialogue with, and consideration of, these diverse religious life-ways promises
to challenge and refine the methodologies of a number of academic disciplines,
whilst greatly enhancing understandings of the world.
This series explores the development of contemporary indigenous religions from
traditional, ancestral precursors, but the characteristic contribution of the series is
its focus on their living and current manifestations. Devoted to the contemporary
expression, experience and understanding of particular indigenous peoples and
their religions, books address key issues which include: the sacredness of land,
exile from lands, diasporic survival and diversification, the indigenization of
Christianity and other missionary religions, sacred language, and re-vitalization
movements. Proving of particular value to academics, graduates, postgraduates
and higher level undergraduate readers worldwide, this series holds obvious
attraction to scholars of Native American studies, Maori studies, African studies
and offers invaluable contributions to religious studies, sociology, anthropology,
geography and other related subject areas.
OTHER TITLES IN THE SERIES
Indigenous Diasporas and Dislocations
Edited by Graham Harvey and Charles D. Thompson Jr.
isBN 978 0 7546 3906 0
Caribbean Diaspora in the USA
Diversity of Caribbean Religions in New York City
Bettina Schmidt
isBN 978 7546 6365 2
The Vitality of Karamojong Religion
Dying Tradition or Living Faith?
Ben Knighton
isBN 978 0 7546 0383 2
Native Christians
Modes and Effects of Christianity among
Indigenous Peoples of the Americas
Edited by
APArECIDA VILAçA
PPGAS, Museu Nacional, UFRJ, Brazil
rOBIN M. WrIGHT
University of Florida, USA
© Aparecida Vilaça and robin M. Wright 2009
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Aparecida Vilaça and robin M. Wright have asserted their moral right under the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the editors of this work.
Published by
Ashgate Publishing Limited Ashgate Publishing Company
Wey Court East Suite 420
Union road 101 Cherry Street
Farnham Burlington, VT 05401-4405
Surrey GU9 7PT USA
England
www.ashgate.com
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Native Christians : modes and effects of Christianity among indigenous peoples of the
Americas. – (Vitality of indigenous religions series)
1. Indians of South America – religion 2. Indians of South America – Missions 3.
Missions – South America 4. Conversion – Christianity 5. South America – religious life
and customs 6. South America – Church history
I. Vilaça, Aparecida II. Wright, robin, 1950–
270’.08998
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Native Christians : modes and effects of Christianity among indigenous peoples of the
Americas / edited by Aparecida Vilaça and robin M. Wright.
p. cm. — (Vitality of indigenous religions series)
ISBN 978-0-7546-6355-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Indians—religion. 2. Indians—
Missions. 3. Christianity and culture—America—History. 4. Catholic Church—
America—History. 5. Protestant churches—America—History. I. Vilaça, Aparecida,
1958– II. Wright, robin M., 1950–
E59.r38N38 2008
277.0089’97—dc22
09ANSHT 2008023030
ISBN 978-0-7546-6355-3
Contents
List of Illustrations and Maps vii
Notes on Contributors ix
Introduction 1
1 Towards a Comparative Study of Jesuit Missions and Indigenous
Peoples in Seventeenth-Century Canada and Paraguay 21
Allan Greer
2 Christians: A Transforming Concept in Peruvian Amazonia 33
Peter Gow
3 ‘Before We Were All Catholics’: Changing religion in Apiao,
Southern Chile 53
Giovanna Bacchiddu
4 Money, Loans and Faith: Narratives and Images of Wealth, Fertility,
and Salvation in the Northern Andes 71
Emilia Ferraro
5 The re-Invention of Mapuche Male Shamans as Catholic Priests:
Legitimizing Indigenous Co-Gender Identities in Modern Chile 89
Ana Mariella Bacigalupo
6 Protestant Evangelism and the Transformability of Amerindian
Bodies in Northeastern Amazonia 109
Vanessa Elisa Grotti
7 The Skin of History: Paumari Perspectives on Conversion and
Transformation 127
Oiara Bonilla
8 Conversion, Predation and Perspective 147
Aparecida Vilaça
9 Shamans and Missionaries: Transitions and Transformations in the
Kivalliq Coastal Area 167
Frédéric B. Laugrand and Jarich G. Oosten
10 Baniwa Art: The Baniwa Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Sustainable
Development 187
Robin M. Wright
vi Native Christians
11 Divine Child and Trademark: Economy, Morality, and Cultural
Sustainability of a Guaraná Project among the Sateré-Mawé, Brazil 211
Wolfgang Kapfhammer
Afterword 229
Joel Robbins
Index of PPeeoopplleess 22��9
Index of Authors 241
Subject Index 245
List of Illustrations and Maps
Illustrations
2.1 Church, Nauta, Bajo Marañon (Peter Gow, 2005) 35
7.1 Paumari man with the skin disease purupuru, or pinta
(Spix and Martius, 1817–1820) 131
8.1 Presentation of new converts in Wari’ Protestant service
(Vilaça, 2007) 148
9.1 The igloo Church of rev. Armand Tagoona as it can be seen today
in Baker Lake, Nunavut 167
10.1 Baniwa baskets in different shapes and sizes make excellent
home and office decorative pieces (Wright, 2008) 187
11.1 Guaraná plants (Paullinia cupana) 214
11.2 Uniawasap’i plants the eye of her child, giving rise to guaraná 216
Maps
Indigenous peoples in Canada xiii
Indigenous peoples in South America xiv
Area of research in Chile 90
Map of Northwest Amazon/Brazil region 193
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Notes on Contributors
Giovanna Bacchiddu is Dr in Social Anthropology (St. Andrews University,
2007) and her PhD dissertation is a study of sociality, kinship and religion in
Apiao, southern Chile. She is author of a number of articles on Apiao, Chiloé. She
is currently working on a project on perceptions of parenthood amongst Italian
adoptive parents of Chilean children.
Ana Mariella Bacigalupo is Dr in Anthropology (UCLA 1994) and Associate
Professor of Anthropology at SUNY Buffalo. She has been working with Mapuche
shamans for sixteen years and has garnered numerous fellowships to support
her research, including a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a rockefeller
Fellowship, a Bellagio Fellowship, an American Association of University Women
Fellowship, and fellowships from the Divinity School and the Center for World
religions at Harvard University. She received the Outstanding Young Investigator
Award and the UB 2020 award for Excellence in Cultural, Historical and Literary/
Textual Studies from the University at Buffalo. Her books include Shamans of the
Foye Tree: Gender, Power and Healing Among the Chilean Mapuche (University
of Texas Press, 2007); La Voz del Kultrun en la Modernidad: Tradición y Cambio
en La Terapéutica de Siete Machi Mapuche (Universidad Católica de Chile press,
2001); and Modernización o Sabiduría en Tierra Mapuche? (San Pablo Press, 1995).
Oiara Bonilla is Dr in Social Anthropology (École des Hautes Études en Sciences
Sociales, Paris, 2007). HHeerr PPhhDD DDiisssseerrttaattiioonn iiss oonn tthhee ssoocciiaall oorrggaanniizzaattiioonn,, mmyytthh
and cultural transformation among the Paumari of the Purus river (Amazonas,
Brazil). Presently she continues researching among the Paumari, concentrating on
the themes of ritual and shamanism, Christianity and its transformations, as well
as on the relations among the Paumari and the whites.
Emilia Ferraro is Dr in Anthropology (University of Kent at Canterbury, 2000),
lecturer at the University of Durham (UK) and lectures regularly in several
Universities in Ecuador. Since 1992 she has been conducting ongoing research
in Ecuador. From 1993 to 1995, and again from 1999 to 2001, she was director
of the School of Applied Anthropology at the Salesian University; from 2001
to 2004 she worked as senior lecturer in the Latin American Faculty of Social
Sciences (FLACSO) and from 2004 to 2007 she was a lecturer at St. Andrews
University (UK). She has also worked as a development consultant for several
Ecuadorian NGOs and International Organizations in Ecuador. Among her books
is Reciprocidad, Don y Deuda. Formas y relaciones de intercambios en los Andes