Wichí
This article may require copy editing for grammar, capitalization, punctuation. (February 2024) |
Total population | |
---|---|
55,734[1][2] | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Argentina, Bolivia | |
Argentina | 50,419 (2010)[2] |
Bolivia | 5,315[1] |
Languages | |
Wichí languages (Wichí Lhamtés Vejoz, Wichí Lhamtés Güisnay, Wichí Lhamtés Nocten), Spanish | |
Religion | |
Traditional tribal religion |
The Wichí are an indigenous people of South America. They are a large group of tribes ranging about the headwaters of the Bermejo River and the Pilcomayo River, in Argentina and Bolivia.
Notes on designation
This ethnic group was named by the English settlers and is still widely known as Mataco. The etymology of the term is obscure but in several sources, it is cited that the Wichí find the term derogatory. Among the group exists a folk etymology for this term, which relates it to the Spanish verb matar, to kill.[3] Thus their preferred name, their own word for themselves, is Wichí, pronounced [wiˈci], and their language, Wichí Lhamtés [wiˈci ɬamˈtes].
There is a pronunciation variant in some areas of Bolivia, [wikˠiʡ], where the self-denomination of the group is Weenhayek wichi, translated by Alvarsson (1988) as "the different people" (pl. Weenhayey). Weenhayey informers of Alvarsson state that the old name was Olhamelh ([oɬameɬ]), meaning simply us. The subgroups within Wichí have been identified and received different names in literature: Nocten or Octenay in Bolivia, Véjos or (perhaps more properly) Wejwus or Wehwos for the Western subgroup(s), and Güisnay for the Eastern subgroups of Argentina. The latter corresponds to Tewoq-lhelej, "the river people".
Population
At present, a number of Wichí groups can be found in Argentina and Bolivia, distributed as follows:
- Argentina:
- 18 groups in the north-west of Chaco, about 180 km north-west of the town of Castelli.
- Many communities in Formosa, departments of Bermejo (15 communities), Matacos (10 communities), Patiño (7 communities) and Ramón Lista (33 communities).
- Other communities are located in Salta, departments of San Martín (21 communities), Rivadavia (57 communities, some of them with just a few individuals), Orán, Metán (2 communities) and Anta (3 communities), being the latter three more isolated; and in Jujuy, departments of Santa Bárbara, San Pedro and Ledesma.
- Bolivia: Gran Chaco province, Tarija Department, on the Pilcomayo River, 14 communities living in the area from (and including) the town of Villa Montes up to D'Orbigny, in the Argentine border.
Ethnologue reports:
- Wichí Lhamtés Güisnay/Pilcomayo Wichí: 27,000 speakers in Argentina (2021)[4]
- Wichí Lhamtés Nocten: 1,900 speakers in Bolivia (2012)[5]
- Wichí Lhamtés Vejoz/Bermejo Wichí: 32,000 speakers in Argentina (2021)[6]
Languages
Wichi are the most widely spoken languages of the Matacoan language family, and include three languages:
The total number of speakers can only be estimated; no reliable figures exist. Comparing several sources, the most probable number is from 40 to 50,000 individuals. The Argentine National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INDEC) gives a figure of 36,135 for Argentina only. In Rosario, the third biggest city of Argentina, there's a community of about 10,000 wichi people, all of them fluent in whichi, and some native speakers. There are even a couple of bilingual primary schools.
For Bolivia, Alvarsson estimated between 1,700 and 2,000 speakers in 1988; a census reported 1,912, and Diez Astete & Riester (1996) estimated between 2,300 and 2,600 Weenhayek in sixteen communities.
According to Najlis (1968) and Gordon (2005), three main dialects can be distinguished in the Wichí group: southwestern or Vejós (Wehwós), northeastern or Güisnay (Weenhayek) and northwestern or Nocten (Oktenay). Tovar (1981) and other authors claim the existence of only two dialects (northeastern and southwestern), while Braunstein (1992-3) identifies eleven ethnical subgroups.
The Wichí language is predominantly
varies with dialect (five or six). The Anglican Church, and particularly Bishop David Leake and his missionary father Alfred Leake before him, has played a crucial role in finding a written form for the Wichí language to record their stories and foundational myths. Many Wichí people are Christian, and Bishop Leake with the support of the Bible Society, translated the entire old and New Testaments into written form for the Wichí to read and hear it in their own language.History
Much of the information available about the history of the Wichí comes from
The Wichí territory does seem to have changed since the 18th century, when the first precise information on their existence and location were known. Their neighbors in the Pilcomayo River area were the
According to Father Alejandro Corrado, a Franciscan of Tarija, the Wichí were
Also in Corrado's words, among the Wichí "everything is in common". He claimed that there was a division of tasks, the men occupying themselves with fishing or occasional hunting with bow or club, and the women doing practically all the other work.
As for religious belief, Corrado wrote that the Wichí medicine men fight off disease "with singing and rattle", that the Wichí believe in a good spirit and a bad spirit, and that the soul of the deceased is reincarnated in an animal. There is old evidence of the use of the entheogen Anadenanthera colubrina by Wichi shamans in Argentina.[7]
The
Current threats
Wichí have traditionally lived from hunting, fishing and basic agriculture. Since the beginning of the 20th century, significant portions of their traditional land have been taken over by outsiders, and what was once a grassland became desertified by deforestation, introduction of cattle and, more recently, by the introduction of alien crops (soybean). A study made in 1998 by a graduate student from Clark University, Worcester, MA based on satellite photo surveys showed that between 1984 and 1996 20% of the forest has been lost.
The Wichí were affected by the
For many years, the Wichí have been struggling to get legal titles to the land they traditionally own, constantly seized and fenced by non-indigenous cattlers and farmers. Their main claims are centered in two large public land areas in eastern Salta, known as Lote 55 (about 2,800 km2) and Lote 14. The Wichí rights to that land have been recognised by law, but no practical enforcement actions have been taken by the Salta provincial government.
At the beginning of 2004, the government of Salta decided to lift the protected status of the General Pizarro Natural Reserve, an area of 250 km2 in the Anta Department inhabited by about 100 Wichí, and sell part of the land to two private companies, Everest SA and Initium Aferro SA, to be deforested and planted with soybean. After months of complaints, legal struggle, and a campaign sponsored by Greenpeace, on 29 September 2005 (after an exposure in a popular TV show) a group of Argentine artists, actors, musicians, models, environmental groups and Wichí representatives arranged a hearing with Chief of Cabinet Alberto Fernández, Director of the National Parks Administration Héctor Espina and President Néstor Kirchner himself. The national government promised to discuss the matter with Salta governor Juan Carlos Romero.
On 14 October 2005 the National Parks Administration and the government of Salta signed an agreement to create a new national protected area in General Pizarro. Of the approximately 213 km2 comprised by the new reserve, the Wichí will have the right of use of 22 km2, and they will own 8 km2.
El Chaco, where Wichí also live, is the largest subtropical dry broadleaf forest of the earth. Currently, the Wichí and other indigenous groups are in danger of losing their land and livelihood to agrobusinesses. Soy and cotton farmers want to cut the trees in order to expand cultivation. The Chaco forest is being cut down six times faster than the Amazon jungle. The greatest profiteers are logging companies. Additionally, soy cultivation has accelerated deforestation. In a lot of cases this also means, that the indigenous communities lose their land to agrobusinesses and suffer under the intense use of fertilizers and pesticides, that poisons the water they depend on. Since 2008, many indigenous people are organised in the “Movimiento Nacional Campesino Indígena” (National Movement of Indigenous Peasants) and fight for the legal right to their land.[8]
Wichí society
Wichí, as other
They build small mud houses with roofs made of leaves and branches, well adapted to the high temperatures of summer that can reach 50
The most popular game among the Wichí is a team sport called `yaj ha`lä, which resembles lacrosse. Games usually last from dawn to dusk without interruption, and are agreed between clans. The magical significance of the game is lost, but it is still a subject of heavy gambling: rival clans bet animals, clothes, seeds and horses on the outcome of the game.
Notes
- ^ a b "Censo de Población y Vivienda 2012 Bolivia Características de la Población". Instituto Nacional de Estadística, República de Bolivia. p. 29. Archived from the original on 2021-08-01. Retrieved 2020-04-01.
- ^ a b "Censo Nacional de Población, Hogares y Viviendas 2010: Resultados definitivos: Serie B No 2: Tomo 1" (PDF) (in Spanish). INDEC. p. 281. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 December 2015. Retrieved 5 December 2015.
- ISBN 0-89789-802-8.
- ^ Pilcomayo Wichí at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ^ Weenhayek at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ^ Bermejo Wichí at Ethnologue (25th ed., 2022)
- ^ Torres, Constantino (1996). "The Use of Anadenanthera colubrina var. Cebil by Wichi (Mataco) Shamans of the Chaco Central, Argentina".
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(help) - ^ Conquest by chainsaw http://www.dandc.eu/en/article/logging-subtropical-dry-forest-deprives-indigenous-people-argentina-their-livelihood
References
This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (November 2020) |
- Adelaar, Willem F.H., (2004). The languages of the Andes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
- Alvarsson, Jan-Åke. (1988). The Mataco of the Gran Chaco: an ethnographic account of change and continuity in Mataco socio-economic organization. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International (Uppsala Studies in Cultural Anthropology, 11).
- Braunstein, José A., 1992-3. "Presentación: esquema provisorio de las tribus chaqueñas". Hacia una Nueva Carta Étnica del Gran Chaco, 4: 1-8. Las Lomitas, Formosa.
- De la Cruz, Luis María, (1990). Grupos aborígenes de Formosa. Localización e identidad étnica (map).
- Dejean, Cristina B.; Crouau-Roy, Brigitte; Goicoechea, Alicia S.; Avena, Sergio A.; Carnese, Francisco R. (2004). "Genetic variability in Amerindian populations of Northern Argentina". Genetics and Molecular Biology. 27 (4): 489–495. .
- Díez Astete, Álvaro and Jürgen Riester, (1995). "Etnias y territorios indígenas". In Kathy Mihotek (ed.), Comunidades, territorios indígenas y biodiversidad en Bolivia. Santa Cruz de la Sierra: UAGRM-Banco Mundial.
- Fabre, Alain (2005). "Los pueblos del Gran Chaco y sus lenguas, segunda parte los mataguayo" [The peoples of the Gran Chaco and their languages, part two: the Mataguayan]. Suplemento antropológico (in Spanish). 40 (2): 313–435.
- Najlis, Elena L. (1968). "Dialectos del Mataco" [Mataco dialects]. Anales de la Universidad del Salvador (in Spanish) (4): 232–241.
- Occhipinti, Laurie (2003). "Claiming a Place Land and Identity in Two Communities in Northwestern Argentina". Journal of Latin American Anthropology. 8 (3): 155–174. .
- Terraza, Jimena, (2001). "Towards a language planning of the endangered languages in Argentina: the case of Wichí in the Southwest of the Province of Salta". Symposium Linguistic Perspectives on Endangered Languages, Helsinki University, Aug.29 to Sep.1, 2001.
- Tovar, A (1981). Relatos y diálogos de los matacos : seguidos de una gramática de su lengua. Madrid: Ediciones Cultura Hispánica. .
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Mataco Indians". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
See also
External links
- Wichi language (research, documentation and education in Argentina)
- Wichi Vocabulary List (from the World Loanword Database)
- Comparative Wichi Swadesh vocabulary list (from Wiktionary's Swadesh list appendix)
- Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. .
- INDEC Archived 2007-04-06 at the Wayback Machine National Institute of Statistics and Censuses of Argentina.
- Grupo Sacham Archived 2009-05-09 at the Wayback Machine
- Chacolinks - Support for the Wichi people of Argentina (reports on the conservation of the language, culture, lands, etc. of the Wichí)
- To Argentina's Wichi, economic collapse means little, from Latin American Studies; taken from The Washington Times, August 13, 2002.
- Survival 2002, a report on current threats to the Wichí's rights.
- The Art of Being Wichi, a Norwegian film that is currently being made on the Wichi Indians by Corax Videoproduksjon as.
- Greenpeace. 22 August 2005. Burning of forest lands in Salta (picture gallery).
- About the General Pizarro Natural Reserve:
- Fundación Ambiente y Recursos Naturales. Programa Control Ciudadano del Medio Ambiente. Caso: Desafectación de Reserva Provincial General Pizarro (provincia de Salta).
- Greenpeace. July 2005. Razones por las que no debe destruirse la Reserva de Pizarro (Salta).
- Biodiversidad en América Latina. Argentina: la Reserva de Pizarro a punto de desaparecer. 26 September 2005.
- Página/12 newspaper, 30 September 2005. El reclamo wichí llegó a la Rosada.
- Página/12 newspaper, 15 October 2005. La reconquista de Pizarro.
- [1] Scholarly paper: Hufty, M. (2008). Pizarro Protected Area: A political ecology perspective on land use, soybeans and Argentina’s nature conservation policy.