"Me deixa em paz!" um relato etnográfico preliminary sobre o isolamento voluntário dos Mashco

Abstract

The paper attempts to give an ethnographic account of the meaning of voluntary isolation for the Mashco people of Peruvian Amazonia. The very nature of voluntary isolation rules out ethnographic research based on participant observation. In the absence of that kind of research, the paper explores what is known about these people through written sources, and especially through what is known ethnographically of their neighbours and relatives, the Piro (Yine) people. Particular attention is paid to what being "left alone" might mean to Mashco people, and to the history and probable significance of their continued use of stone axes and their abandonment of agriculture.