Society-GUARANI

At the time of the first European contacts in the early sixteenth
century, the Guarani occupied vast areas of southern Brazil, the neighboring
territories of Uruguay and Argentina, and land lying to the east of
the Paraguay River in the modern state of Paraguay. The area occupied
ranged from lat. 26 degrees-33 degrees S by long. 48 degrees-52 degrees
W.

The term Guarani has been used in a number of different ways, and
this has led to confusion concerning the identification of the Guarani.
According to Watson (1952: 18-19), the term Guarani has been used
in at least three different ways. First, it has been used to refer
to a language spoken by a rather large group of people who inhabited
the area first colonized by the Spanish. In a second and related sense,
the term has been used to designate a generalized cultural pattern
characteristic of the Indians who spoke the Guarani language.

The term Guarani is often found in the compound expression Tupi-Guarani,
which is also used in the two senses discussed above. The Tupi inhabited
the area north of the Guarani in Brazil and were first encountered
by Portuguese explorers and colonists. Watson seriously doubts that
there ever were any significant differences, linguistically or culturally,
between the Tupi and the Guarani. The terminological distinction is
merely indicative of the presence of two different European colonial
administrations.

The third sense in which the term Guarani has been used is to differentiate
acculturated from non-acculturated Indians. The missionized Indians
became known as Guarani, while those who avoided conversion became
known as Cayua or Caingua, a name which roughly translates as "men
of the forest." The Cayua are also speakers of the Guarani language.
In the sense that Guarani signifies a vaguely-defined group of acculturated
Indians (including Mestizos), the entire rural population of Paraguay
is often referred to as Guarani (Metraux 1948: 69).

There are several other factors that contribute to the confusion in
nomenclature and classification. Although the Guarani-speakers all
shared a generalized cultural pattern, they were divided into many
small local groups or bands. These bands were often named for their
chiefs or for the localities they inhabited. Hence, over the 400 years
in which people have been writing about the Guarani, many names have
been used either as alternatives to Guarani or to indicate subgroups,
with their exact status and relationship to each other unclear. Anthropologists
and others who have studied the Guarani have each studied slightly
different groups inhabiting slightly different territories. Each of
these writers has constructed his or her own model of who the Guarani
are and how they are subdivided.

In this description, the example set by Metraux and Watson will be
followed, i.e, using the term "Cayua" to refer to the Guarani who
were not missionized and who have been subject to a minimal amount
of acculturation. At the present time, these Cayua live in small reservations
or villages under government supervision and protection in isolated
areas of southern Brazil and Paraguay. Population figures are extremely
difficult to find for the Guarani, and they are usually in the form
of rough estimates. The estimate of the Brazilian Cayua population
as of 1943 was between 2,000 and 4,000 individuals.

Aboriginally, subsistence was based on slash-and-burn agriculture.
The principal crops were manioc, maize, sweet potatoes, beans, squash,
peanuts, cara (Dioscorea sp.), mangara (Aroidea sp.), mbakuku (a leguminosea),
watermelons, bananas, pineapples, and papaya. This diet was supplemented
by hunting, limited fishing, and gathering. Men did the hunting and
fishing and were responsible for the initial clearing activities in
agriculture. The actual cultivation was left to the women.

The most important economic unit was the extended family. This group
owned the agricultural fields and worked them communally. The extended
family was also the most important residential and social unit. They
lived in a longhouse known as a tapui. Tapui were often located at
some distance from each other, which gave some early chroniclers the
impression that each tapui was a separate "tribe." Territorial organization
beyond the tapui is unclear. According to Watson, each tapui was ruled
by an old man, and the extended family was probably patrilineal and
patrilocal (1952: 33). Schaden, however, points out that the bilateral
kindred was also important, and that the Cayua also practiced matrilocality
(1962: 94, 137).

Although the identity and the responsibilities of the headman are
uncertain, it seems clear that the shaman exercised a great deal of
supernatural and secular influence. Every person, both male and female,
had a certain degree of knowledge about medicine, magic, and withcraft,
but the shamans had familiar spirits, and their duties involved rainmaking,
divination, curing, and ceremonial leadership. The secular power and
importance of the shamans may have increased after White contact,
particularly in response to the intense missionary activity conducted
by the Jesuits. During the nineteenth century, there were numerous
revivalistic and messianic movements instigated and led by shamans.

Although the Cayua are relatively unacculturated, there have been
important changes in their way of life. The most significant of these
have been in technology, economic sex roles, and the shift of emphasis
to the nuclear family. The tapui has almost entirely disappeared,
and nuclear families now live in single-family dwellings. However,
related families still tend to locate their dwellings near each other,
approximating what would have been a tapui group in former times.

The Cayua continue to subsist by agriculture, hunting, and fishing.
In recent times, however, hunting and fishing have decreased in importance,
and men have become much more active in agriculture. Both men and
women are now described as being primarily agriculturalists. Changa,
a kind of wage labor in exchange for White trade goods, is practiced
by a few Cayua.

Politically, the Cayua are now under the administration of the government,
and village officials are appointed by the administrators in charge
of the area.

The basic orienting source to the culture is Metraux (1948), which
is a general cultural summary based on a wide range of secondary source
material, including many early historical documents. It portrays what
may be characterized as the mythical, pure, traditional Guarani, who
exist in the timeless ethnographic present.

The spatial focus here is on the Cayua of southern Brazil. Although
field dates range from 1943 to 1962, large amounts of material have
been derived from secondary sources, covering a 400-year time span.

Culture summary by Marlene M. Martin and John M. Beierle



Metraux, Alfred.
 The Guarani.
 In Julian H. Steward, ed.
 Handbook of South American Indians.
 Vol.
 3.
 Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office, 1948: 69-94.
 Schaden, Egon.
 Aspectos fundamentas da cultura Guarani [Fundamental aspects of Guarani culture].
 Sao Paulo, Difusao Europeia do Livro, 1962.
 191 p. illus.
 Watson, James Bennett.
 Cayua culture change: a study in acculturation and methodology.
 Menasha, American Anthropological Association, 1952.
 144 p. illus., map.


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