Predatory Economies : The Sanema and the Socialist State in Contemporary Amazonia / Amy Penfield.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Penfield, Amy, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Guaharibo Indians--Venezuela--Economic conditions.

Guaharibo Indians.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (227 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Austin : University of Texas Press, [2023]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

A study of the modes of predation used by and against the Sanema people of Venezuela. Predation is central to the cosmology and lifeways of the Sanema-speaking Indigenous people of Venezuelan Amazonia, but it also marks their experience of modernity under the socialist "Bolivarian" regime and its immense oil wealth. Yet predation is not simply violence and plunder. For Sanema people, it means a great deal more: enticement, seduction, persuasion. It suggests an imminent threat but also opportunity and even sanctuary. Amy Penfield spent two and a half years in the field, living with and learning from Sanema communities. She discovered that while predation is what we think it is-invading enemies, incursions by gold miners, and unscrupulous state interventions-Sanema are not merely prey. Predation, or appropriation without reciprocity, is essential to their own activities. They use predatory techniques of trickery in hunting and shamanism activities, while at the same time, they employ tactics of manipulation to obtain resources from neighbors and from the state. A richly detailed ethnography, Predatory Economies looks beyond well-worn tropes of activism and resistance to tell a new story of agency from an Indigenous perspective.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Key Characters

INTRODUCTION. Locating Predators and Prey

CHAPTER 1. Predation, Then and Now

CHAPTER 2. Extracting Good Things

CHAPTER 3. Horizons of the Unknown

CHAPTER 4. Subterranean Forces

CHAPTER 5. Invoking the State

CHAPTER 6. Forest Papers

EPILOGUE. Predatory Economies in Amazonia and Beyond

Acknowledgments

Notes

References

Index

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781477327104

147732710X

9781477327098

1477327096

OCLC:

1365622424