From Publishers Weekly
"The white presence, artificially imposed on other cultures, creates a destructive and hostile climate," state the authors in this passionate and powerful volume originally published more than 20 years ago in France and reissued recently there. Having lived among the Indians of the Amazon basin in the late '60s, cultural anthropologists Meunier and Savarin were angered about the treatment of the native peoples and pessimistic about their future. Here they review the history of Amazonia, from the explorers and missionaries of the 16th century to today's traders, miners and loggers. They report on their visits with shamans and storytellers, recounting a trip among the Chacobo Indians and a wild raft ride on the Yata River. Noting that storytelling is the consummate art of the Indians, Meunier and Savarin suggest that their propensity to integrate imagination into quotidian reality may be an antidote to the dehumanizing effect of Western culture.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
The pressures of population and profit-driven capitalism have intensified the destruction of the Amazon and the massacre of its indigenous peoples. In this elegant plea to save the Amazon, the authors, both anthropologists, chronicle the conquest of the Amazon and the excesses committed in the name of progress from the arrival of Spanish and Portuguese soldiers and missionaries to the more recent activities of rubber barons and land speculators. Vividly portraying the social and economic realities threatening the Amazon, the authors construct an image of a world on the brink of disaster. They conclude that preservation of the Amazon is the preservation of the planet. Recommended for academic and public libraries.
- John M. Weeks, Univ. of Minnesota Lib., Minneapolis
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
- John M. Weeks, Univ. of Minnesota Lib., Minneapolis
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
