Munduruku

For other uses, seeMunduruku (disambiguation).

Mundurucu

Total population
13,755 (2014)
Regions with significant populations
Brazil(Amazonas,Mato Grosso,Pará)
Languages
Munduruku,Portuguese

TheMunduruku,also known asMundurucuorWuy Jugu,are anindigenous people of Brazilliving in theAmazon Riverbasin. Some Munduruku communities are part of theCoatá-Laranjal Indigenous Land.They had an estimated population in 2014 of 13,755.

History

Traditionally the Munduruku's territory, called Mundurukânia in the 19th century, was theTapajósriver valley.In 1788, they completely defeated their ancient enemies theMuras.After 1803 they lived at peace with theBrazilians.

The Munduruku live in southwest of the state of Pará along the Tapajós river and its tributaries in the municipalities ofSantarém,ItaitubaandJacareacanga,in the east of the state ofAmazonasalong theCanumã Riverin the municipality ofNova Olindaand the municipality ofBorba,and in the north of the state ofMato Grossoin thePeixes Riverregion in the municipality ofJuara.They usually inhabit forest regions on the margins of navigable rivers, and their traditional villages are in "Tapajós fields", patches of savannah within the Amazon rainforest. The largest numbers live in theMunduruku Indigenous Territory,with most of the villages along theCururu River,a tributary of the Tapajós.

Today the Munduruku face threats to their homelands from the dams of theTapajós hydroelectric complex,illegal gold-panning, and a new waterway construction on the Tapajós River. The reservoir of the proposedChacorão Damon the Tapajós river would flood 18,700 hectares (46,000 acres) of the Munduruku Indigenous Territory. The reservoir of the proposedSão Luiz do Tapajós Damon the Tapajós would flood about 7% of theSawré Muybu Indigenous Territory.

Name

External videos
Mundurukú Headdress: a glimpse of life in the Amazon rainforest,SmarthistoryatKhan Academy

Also known as theMundurucu,Maytapu,andCara Preta,the Munduruku call themselvesWuy Jugu.Oral historysays the name "Muduruku" comes from their enemies theParintintin peopleand means "red ants," based on the historical Munduruku tactic of attacking en masse.

Culture

The Munduruku have a distinctive residence pattern. Rather than a pattern based on conjugal or affinal bonds, in the Munduruku villages, all males over the age of thirteen live in one household, and all of the females live with all of the males under thirteen in another.

Language

TheMunduruku languageis part of theTupi languagefamily.

According to Gomes (2006), "widely known byMundurukú,the historically famous 'head cutters' call themselveswuyjuyu'people.' Considered in the past 'one of the most warlike, powerful and intelligent tribes of Brazil (...)' (Hartt, 1884), this Brazilian indigenous community seeks today to 'cut off the head 'of enemies through dialogue, not only territorial disputes are part of this 'war', but also disputes over health, linguistic, social and cultural education and self-preservation. "

They are also notable for their linguistic separation of "us" (their tribe) from "them" (everyone else), thepariwat.Whereas they refer to themselves as thewuujuyû,or "our people", everyone else is spoken of as the equivalent of "prey".

Munduruku Indians, painted byHercules Florence

Unlike thePirahã,the Munduruku have anumeracysystem, albeit limited (similar to that found in someAboriginal Australiancultures).Pierre Picawas instrumental (in a work done in collaboration withStanislas DehaeneandElizabeth Spelke) in revealing thepsychophysicsandlinguisticproperties of the Munduruku counting system to theWestern world.The Munduruku have number words up to onlyfive,although each word is not as definite in meaning as number words inEnglish,and the lexical limitation is no obstacle to their making calculations involving larger numbers.Furthermore, the Munduruku use logarithmic mapping of numbers to assess scales, a point cited as possible evidence for the notion that this kind of numbering is innate, whereas the linear mode has to be acquired by study.

Notable Munduruku

• Daniel Munduruku,educator, author, museum director

Sources

• Bossomaier, Terry (2014)."Language Networks".In Stocker, Robert; Bossomaier, Terry (eds.).Networks in Society: Links and Language.CRC Press. pp. 49–79.ISBN978-9-814-36482-9.
• Farias, Elaíze (19 April 2016),"Funai reconhece território tradicional Sawré Muybu dos Munduruku"[Funai recognises the traditional Sawré Muybu territory of the Munduruku],Amazônia Real(in Portuguese),retrieved16 February2017
• Fearnside, Philip M. (2015), "Amazon dams and waterways: Brazil's Tapajo's Basin plans",Ambio,44(5): 426–39,doi:10.1007/s13280-015-0642-z,PMC4510327,PMID25794814
• Munduruku: Localização e população,ISA: Instituto Socioambeintal,retrieved14 February2017
• Varshney, Lav R.; Sun, John Z. (2015)."Why Do We Perceive Logarithmically?".In Pitici, Mircea (ed.).The Best Writing on Mathematics 2014.Princeton University Press.pp. 64–73.ISBN978-0-691-16417-5.

External links

• "Cognition and arithmetics capability: what the Mundurucus Indians can teach us",CNRS Press release October 2004
• Amazon Children "Spontaneously" Understand GeometryNational Geographic News, January 2006
• "Mastering the Geometry of the Jungle",New York Times, 24 June 2006
• "Intuitions of number-space in Amazonian Indigenous groups"CEA Press release, June 2008.
• Pica, P; Lecomte, A (2008)."Theoretical implications of the study of Numbers and Numerals in Mundurucu".Philosophical Psychology.21(4): 4.doi:10.1080/09515080802285461.S2CID145361530.
• Pica, P, C Lemer, V Izard & Dehaene, S. (2004), "Exact and approximate arithmetic in an Amazonian Indigene Group"Science, 306, pp. 499–503.
• Dehaene, S., Izard, V., Spelke, E & Pica, P (2008), "Log or linear Distinct Intuitions of the number scale in Western and Amazonian Indigene Culture"Science 320, 5880, 1217–20
• Wuy Jugu artwork,National Museum of the American Indian