A shout of alert from inside the heart of hutukara: Memories of gold mining in yanomami literature

Abstract

In November 2021, the Hutukara Yanomami Association (Hutukara Associação Yanomami HAY), which works in the defense of indigenous peoples, presented a letter to the press to denounce the ineffectiveness of the Brazilian government in relation to the invasion of the gold mines and the disregard for the Yanomami people s health and life. The letter was presented by Dario Kopenawa Yanomami, Davi Kopenawa Yanomami s son. Davi is president of the HAY and the main character of A queda do céu (The fall of the sky, free translation), a landmark in contemporary indigenous literature and a manifesto in the defense of the life and the forest. The results of the data crossing showed that in 2021 the Yanomami territory, demarcated and ratified since 1992, has been brutally torn apart by gold mining the population of 27,000 Yanomami shares its territory with 20,000 illegal miners. Rivers in the region are contaminated by mercury, which compromises the food security of the entire community. This article aims to reflect from the perspective of environmental history and indigenous history on Davi Kopenawa s ideas, intertwining the analysis of the literary text with the data presented by the Social Environmental Institute (Instituto Socioambiental), with photographs by Cláudia Andujar and images from the Superintendence for the Development of the Amazon (Superintendência do Desenvolvimento da Amazônia) magazine in the period of the dictatorship.