La etnohistoria de los eventos y de los eventos nulos

Este artículo que fue presentado en 1998 en la reunión anual de la American Society for Ethnohistory (Sociedad Americana de Etnohistoria) analiza diversas definiciones historiográficas de lo que significa un evento y apela por una caracterización más reflexiva y cautelosa de los eventos significativos en la investigación etnohistórica. Después de introducir algunas definiciones positivistas y apriorísticas de los eventos históricos, el autor presenta una crítica de estas definiciones basada en las contribuciones de la escuela de los Annales y de la antropología estructuralista. El ensayo sostiene que los eventos históricos significativos e incluso los eventos significativos silenciosos no son evidentes como fenómenos universales, sino son el producto de la conciencia histórica particular de las sociedades indígenas o europeas. El autor propone una breve taxonomía de los eventos nulos pseudo eventos, eventos imaginados, eventos epítome, eventos latentes y eventos negados que ejemplifica el rango de la conciencia histórica de varios grupos indígenas de Norteamérica en su confrontación con el poder colonial europeo en los siglos XVIII y XIX

Um aroma no ar: a ecologia histórica das plantas anti-fantasma entre os Guajá da Amazônia

Entre as plantas medicinais dos Guajá da Amazônia oriental incluem-se várias usadas para repelir os fantasmas dos mortos. Esse artigo discute as plantas repelentes de fantasmas aiyã, em termos de seu significado simbólico, eficácia biológica, e contexto histórico-ecológico. Plantas repelentes de fantasmas são identificadas por seu odor pungente, que age sobre o odor fétido - causador de doenças - dos fantasmas dos mortos. A eficácia da cura pode também relacionar-se a sua interferência com o chamado "fenômeno proustiano", que se refere ao poder dos estímulos olfativos de evocar memórias do passado. Como tais, repelentes de fantasmas podem funcionar, em certo sentido, para afastar memórias e lidar com a dor da perda. Por fim, discutem-se evidências de que a predominância de repelentes de fantasmas entre as plantas medicinais dos Guajá é um efeito da baixa populacional maciça subseqüente ao contato europeu.<br>The medicinal plants of the Guajá people of eastern Amazonia include a number of plants that are used to repel the ghosts of the dead. This work discusses the aiyã ghost repellent plants in terms of their symbolic meaning, biological efficacy, and historical ecological context. Ghost repellent plants are identified through their pungent smell, which counteract the disease-causing foul smell of the ghosts of the dead. The efficacy of the cure may also relate to its interference with the so-called "Proustian phenomenon," which refers to the power of olfactory stimuli to evoke memories of the past. As such, ghost repellent plants may function, in a sense, to repel memory and cope with grief. Finally, evidence is discussed the predominance of ghost repellent plants among the Guajá is an artifact of massive depopulation in the wake of European contact

The Transformation of Social Institutions in the North American Southeast

Corporate institutions, which transformed in the American Southeast over some 14,000 years, include social heterarchies and hierarchies that arose within the institutional contexts of descent groups, ritual sodalities, and social houses. The strategic and tactical actions of competitive and cooperative agents contributed to differing expressions of organizational changes through a variety of forms, including feasting, feuding/warfare, inalienable goods circulation, indebtedness, monumental constructions, mortuary events, processions/rogations, strategic marriages, and additional ritual and social practices. The nexus of social institutions that evolved along these pathways served as a catalyst for social changes, including the ways through which social institutions became transformed. Such social processes inform archaeologists of the agency, organization, and practice of people who not only invented and manipulated cosmologies, ideologies, institutions, and resources to achieve varying degrees of inequality, power, and wealth, but also those who resisted the efforts of aggrandizers. The author’s arguments focus on aristocratic social actions and actors, and the practices that enabled them to gain power and wealth through exclusive and restrictive corporate institutions