The Andean Cosmovision of the Kallawaya

The Kallawaya ethnic group, based in the mountainous Bautista Saavedra region north of La Paz, traces its roots to the pre-Inca period. Like many aspects of Andean culture, the Kallawaya’s practices and values have evolved through the fusion of native and Christian religions.

The principal activity of the Kallawaya involves the practice of ancestral medical techniques. The various rites and ceremonies related to these techniques form the basis of their local economy. The Andean Cosmovision of the Kallawaya culture consists of a coherent body of myths, rituals, values and artistic expressions. Widely recognized not only in Bolivia but also in many other South American countries where Kallawaya priest doctors practise, the medical techniques are based on the belief systems of indigenous peoples of the Andean area.

This healing art derives from a deep understanding of animal, mineral and botanical pharmacopoeia and a body of ritual knowledge intimately linked to religious beliefs. The exclusively male itinerant healers treat patients using medical and pharmaceutical knowledge that revolves around a complex system of transmission and apprenticeship in which the journey plays an essential role. By travelling through widely varying ecosystems, Kallawaya healers expand their knowledge of medicinal plants. With some 980 species, their botanical pharmacopoeia rates as one of the richest in the world. Kallawaya women participate in a number of rites, care for pregnant women and children, and weave textiles with motifs and decoration relating to the Kallawaya cosmovision. Musical groups called kantus play the drum and pan flute during ritual ceremonies in order to establish contact with the world of the spirits.

In recent times, the traditional Kallawaya way of life has come under threat from acculturation, which may lead to the disappearance of this extraordinary body of medical knowledge. The tradition is also affected by the lack of sufficient legal protection for indigenous communities, particularly in regard to policies pursued by major pharmaceutical companies.

Inscribed in 2008 on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity (originally proclaimed in 2003)

© Text and images: UNESCO

The Kágaba of Colombia

Exhibition: Photography as Document: The Kágaba of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia
Dates: Fri 22 October 2010 - Sun 30 January 2011

Open daily except monday: 10 am to 6 pm

Place: Museen Dahlem, Lansstraße 8, Berlin, Germany

Admission:

Webpage:

About the exhibition:

The expulsion of the native population was one of the many consequences of the Spanish conquest of the Caribbean coast of Colombia in the 16th century. And yet it was possible for the evicted ethnic groups to reorganise in the nearby mountain massif, where they have kept up their traditions to the present day. Even the chronicles of the conquistadors and missionaries reflect the fascination exercised by the mountains and their population.

Visual documents relating to them are however rare. This makes the photos of Wouter Bokma of Amsterdam, taken in the seventies, a valuable record of a world subject to constant change. Starting with the documentation of a traditional festival in a Kágaba village, the exhibition - which emerges from a seminar of the Latin American Institute of the Free University of Berlin - goes on to pose fundamental questions about our attitude to what goes by the name of 'ethnic photography' - questions relating to the perspective of photographers, the historical implications of their research, the visualisation of power structures and symbolic representation generally.

Held as part of the Berlin contribution to the European Month of Photography.

About the museum:

Ethnological Museum

With a total of 500,000 objects from throughout the world and large numbers of sound recordings, documentary photographs and films, the Ethnological Museum ranks among the largest and best of its kind. The museum collects, preserves and researches cultural products of pre-industrial societies, primarily outside of Europe.

The museum currently embraces the following collections: Africa, American archaeology, American ethnology, Europe, the Islamic World, Eastern and Northern Asia, South and South-East Asia, the South Seas and Australia, as well as the ethnology of music. The Children's Museum is also located here.

© Text and image: Ethnological Museum of Berlin

Yakut ritual cup

Name: Yakut ritual cup for drinking fermented mare milk

Origin: Yakutsk Region, Siberia, Russia

Date: Early 20th century

Museum: The Russian Museum of Ethnology

Materials: wood

Comments:

Yakuts originally migrated from Olkhon and the region of Lake Baikal to the basins of the Middle Lena, the Aldan and Vilyuy rivers, where they mixed with other northern indigenous peoples of Russia such as the Evens and Evenks.

The northern Yakuts were largely hunters, fishermen and reindeer herders, while the southern Yakut raised cattle and horses.

In the 1620s Russians began to move into their territory and annexed it, imposed a fur tax, and managed to suppress several Yakut rebellions between 1634 and 1642. The discovery of gold and, later, the building of the Trans-Siberian Railway, brought ever-increasing numbers of Russians into the region. By the 1820s almost all the Yakuts had been converted to the Russian Orthodox church although they retained, and still retain, a number of Tengrianist practices.

In 1919 the new Soviet government named the area the Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.

In the late 1920's through the late 1930's, Yakut people were systematically persecuted, when Joseph Stalin launched his ruthless collectivization campaign. The Soviet regime established numerous forced labour camps (generally known as the GULAG system) where hundreds of thousands from all over the Union were sent for imprisonment. Tens of thousands of Yakuts also disappeared there, and not until the late 1960s had the Yakut population recovered to pre-collectivization levels.

The cuisine of Sakha consists predominatly of traditional drink kumis, sliced frozen salted fish, loaf meat dishes, venison, frozen fish, thick pancakes, and Salamat - a millet porridge. Kourchah, a popular dessert, is made of mare milk. Indigirka is a traditional salad. This cuisine is only used in Yakutia.

Yakuts, the most Northern horse-breeders in the world, moved twice a year (from the winter camp where they lived in a stationary log dwelling " tent" to the summer camp where they lived in the birch-bark dwelling "uras"). They moved mounted. In front of the procession teenagers drove cattle, then loaded pack animals followed, then members of the families on the horsebacks. Women put the cradles with babies in front of them on the saddles. It took only two or three hours to dismantle yurts, pack things and load animals. When people moved to the summer camp it was considered to be a festive occasion and was preceded with various purification rites and was held according to strict ritual rules.

© Photos and text: www.eng.ethnomuseum.ru

Mexican huevos rancheros

Huevos rancheros (Ranch Eggs) is a classic Mexican breakfast dish popular throughout much of the Americas consisting of eggs served in the style of the traditional large mid-morning fare on rural farms.

The basic dish consists of fried eggs served upon lightly fried corn tortillas topped with a tomato-chili sauce. Refried beans, slices of avocado, or guacamole accompany the dish.

As the popularity of the dish spread beyond Mexico variations using wheat flour tortillas instead of corn and pureed chili or enchilada sauce instead of tomato-chili salsa have appeared. Non-Mexican additions such as cheese and sour cream and garnishes of fresh tomatoes and lettuce also have become common beyond the dish's native range.

Mexican huevos rancheros

Ingredients:

• 6 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 8 5-in. corn tortillas
• 2 14 oz. cans whole tomatoes in juice
• 1/2 cup chopped white onion
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro plus additional for sprinkling
• 1 tablespoon chopped canned chipotle chiles in adobo
• 2 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 8 large eggs

How to cook it

Preheat your oven to 200º F. Place oven-proof dinner plates in oven to warm

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a 10-inch heavy skillet over moderate heat until hot but not smoking. Stack 2 tortillas in skillet and cook 30 seconds, then flip stack over with tongs and cook 30 seconds more. While second tortilla cooks on bottom, turn top tortilla over with tongs, keeping tortillas stacked. Flip stack again and cook in same manner, turning over top tortilla and flipping stack again so that both tortillas are softened and both sides puff slightly, then deflate (do not let them become browned or crisp). Wrap tortillas loosely in foil and keep warm in oven. Fry remaining tortillas in same manner, adding 1 tablespoon oil to skillet for each batch. (Do not clean skillet.)

Puree tomatoes with their juice, onion, cilantro, chipotle, garlic, and salt in a blender until very smooth. Carefully add mixture to hot skillet (it may spatter) and simmer, stirring occasionally, until salsa is slightly thickened, about 10 minutes.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a 12-inch heavy nonstick skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then crack 4 eggs into skillet and cook 3 to 4 minutes for runny yolks, or to desired doneness. Transfer to a plate and keep warm, covered, then cook remaining 4 eggs in remaining tablespoon oil in same manner. Season eggs with salt and pepper.

Spoon 1/4 cup salsa onto each plate and top with 2 tortillas, slightly overlapping them. Transfer 2 eggs to tortillas on each plate and top with some of remaining salsa. Sprinkle with cilantro.

© Text and image: Wikipedia / Recipe: www.world-recipes.info  

Turumba

Title: Turumba

Director: Kidlat Tahimik

Writer: Kidlat Tahimik

Year: 1981

Running time: 95 minutes

Country: Philippines

Plot summary:

Set in a tiny Philippine village, the inimitable Kidlat Tahimik's film focuses on a family that makes paper-mache animals to sell during the traditional Turumba festivities. One year, a department store buyer purchases all their stock. When she returns with an order for 500 more (this time with the word "Oktoberfest" painted on them), the family's seasonal occupation becomes year-round alienated labor.

© Text and photo: Wikipedia

See the movie on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jw3hgSlfozs&feature=related

The Vedda of Sri Lanka

Name: Vedda

Living Area: Sri Lanka

Population: <2.000

Language: Vedda

Comments:   

The Wanniyala-Aetto, or "forest people" are more commonly known as Veddas or Veddahs.

The original language of the Veddas is the Vedda language. Today it is used primarily by the interior Veddas. Communities, such as Coast Veddas and Anuradhapura Veddas, that do not identify themselves strictly as Veddas also use Vedda language in part for communication during hunting and or for religious chants. When a systematic field study was conducted in 1959 it was determined that the language was confined to the older generation of Veddas from Dambana. In 1990s self-identifying Veddas knew few words and phrases in the Vedda language, but there were individuals who knew the language comprehensively. Initially there was considerable debate amongst linguists as to whether Vedda is a dialect of Sinhalese or an independent language. Later studies indicate that it diverged from its parent stock in the 10th century and became a Creole and a stable independent language by the 13 century, under the influence of Sinhalese.

The parent Vedda language(s) is of unknown genetic origins, while Sinhalese is of the Indo-Aryan branch of Indo-European languages. Phonologically it is distinguished from Sinhalese by the higher frequency of palatal sounds C and J. The effect is also heightened by the addition of inanimate suffixes. Morphologically Vedda language word class is divided into nouns, verbs and invariables with unique gender distinctions in animate nouns. Per its Creole tradition, it has reduced and simplified many forms of Sinhalese such as second person pronouns and denotations of negative meanings. Instead borrowing new words from Sinhalese Vedda created combinations of words from a limited lexical stock. Vedda also maintains many archaic Sinhalese terms prior to the 10th to 12th centuries, as a relict of its close contact with Sinhalese. Vedda also retains a number of unique words that cannot be derived from Sinhalese. Conversely, Sinhalese has also borrowed from the original Vedda language, words and grammatical structures, differentiating it from its related Indo-Aryan languages. Vedda has exerted a substratum influence in the formation of Sinhalese.

Animism is the original religion of Veddas. The Sinhalized interior Veddas follow a mix of animism and nominal Buddhism whereas the Tamilized east coast Veddas follow a mix of animism and nominal Hinduism, known as folk Hinduism amongst anthropologists.

The Vedda marriage ceremony is a very simple affair. The ritual consists of the bride tying a bark rope (diya lanuva) of her own twisting, around the waist of the bridegroom. This is the essence of the Vedda marriage and is symbolic of the bride's acceptance of the man as her mate and life partner. Although marriage between cross-cousins was the norm until recently, this has changed significantly, with Vedda women even contracting marriages with their Sinhalese and Moor neighbours.

In Vedda society, woman is in many respects man's equal. She is entitled to similar inheritance. Monogamy is the general rule, though a widow would be frequently married by her husband's brother as a means of support and consolation (widow inheritance).

Well-known by: their cult of the dead

One of the most distinctive features of Vedda religion is the worship of dead ancestors: these are termed "nae yaku" among the Sinhala-speaking Veddas. There are also peculiar deities that are unique to Veddas. One of them is "Kande Yakka".

Veddas along with the Island's Buddhist, Hindu and Muslim communities venerate the temple complex situated at Kataragama, showing the syncretism that has evolved over 2,000 years of coexistence and assimilation. Kataragama is supposed to be the site at which the Hindu god Skanda or Murugan in Tamil met and married a local tribal girl, Valli, who in Sri Lanka is believed to have been a Vedda.

There are a number of other shrines across the island, not as famous as Kataragama that are as sacred to the Veddas as well as to other communities.

© Text and images: Wikipedia