“Becoming” Tsunki

The concept of change and transformation in the gender imagery of Shuar ánent

Autores

  • Nora Bammer Universität Wien

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.69696/somanlu.v23i2.14630

Palavras-chave:

Shuar ánent, Gender, Tsunki

Resumo

As one of the most identity sustaining genres of Shuar songs and singing in Ecuadorian Amazonia, the spiritual ánent songs are infused with spirits, ghosts, animals, and metaphoric beings, rooted in complex myths and personal narratives. They serve as tools for addressing and transforming specific life matters, with the singer aspiring to embody the spirits they invoke. Among these spiritual entities, Tsunki, a potent water spirit, transcending binary gender associations, emerged as a focal point in my explorations on gendered dimensions of Shuar songs and singing. Conversations with Shuar individuals like Raquel Antun, Tiris Taisha, Yampauch Tiwi, and Nujinúa Jimpíkit revealed varying perceptions of Tsunki, oscillating between a female, magical, and erotic spirit to a male figure akin to a god of water and healing. These diverse portrayals caused me to take a closer look at the gender imagery and the transformative elements within the Shuar ánent.

This paper aims to explain how the ánent, as personalized musical and emotional projections of myth, possess the transformative power to construct, deconstruct, and transform identities and societal realities. Drawing on Deleuzian concepts of becoming and multiplicities, as well as Butler's theories on the social construction of gender, the analysis navigates through shifting subject positions of the singer and the human and non-human listeners involved in the ánent-induced transformation, including my own subject position.

Acknowledging the colonial imposition of gender constructs on Indigenous cultures, the paper interweaves discussions on the impact of Christian missions and the coloniality of gender, drawing inspiration from María Lugones' work. Through contextual, analytical, and self-reflective lenses, the research aims to offer a critical view of the construct and deconstruction of gender within Shuar society. The perceived ambiguities surrounding Tsunki's gender also serve as a lens through which to analyze the complexities of coloniality and decoloniality within transcendent Shuar identities.

Downloads

Não há dados estatísticos.

Referências

BAMMER DE RODRIGUEZ, Nora. “La voz mágica. El ánent shuar como puente sonoro entre los mundos.” In: BRABEC DE MORI, Bernd Brabec; LEWY, Matthias; GARCÍA, Miguel A. (Eds). Mundos audibles de América: Cosmologías y prácticas sonoras de los pueblos indígenas. Berlin: Gebr. Mann Verlag. (Estudios Indiana, 8), 2015.

BAMMER, Nora. “Lied- und Lautsphären der Shuar und ihrer Geister. Auditive Machtwährung im südöstlichen Amazonasbecken Ecuadors.” In: BRABEC DE MORI, B.; WINTER, M. Auditive Wissenskulturen. Berlin, Springer VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2018.

BLACKING, John. “Some problems of the theory and method in the study of musical change.” Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council, 9, p. 1-26, 1977.

BRABEC DE MORI, Bernd. The magic of song, the invention of tradition and the structuring of time among the Shipibo (Peruvian Amazon). Jahrbuch des Phono- grammarchivs der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2: 169-192, 2011.

BROWN, Michael F. Tsewa’s gift: magic and meaning in an Amazonian society. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1986.

BUTLER, Judith. Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. London: Routledge, Chapman & Hall, Inc, 1990.

——. “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory.” Theatre Journal, 40(4), p. 519-531, 1988.

DELEUZE, Gilles; GUATTARI, Félix. A Thousand Platteaus. (Translation and fore- word by Brian Massumi), London: Bloomsbury Academic. (Reprinted of orig. 1987 Mille Plateaux. University of Minnesota), 2014.

DESCOLA, Philipp. Leben und Sterben in Amazonien, Bei den Jívaro-Indianern. Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2011.

DEUTSCH, Francine. “Undoing Gender.” Gender & Society, 21(1), p. 106-127, 2007.

DIETZE, Gabriele. “Decolonizing Gender - Gendering Decolonial Theory: Crosscurrents and Archaeologies.” In: BROECK, S. J. et al. Postcoloniality - Decoloniality - Black Critique: Joints and Fissures. Frankfurt am Main; New York: Campus-Verlag, p. 245-268, 2014.

JUNCOSA, José E. Etnografia de la comunicacion verbal Shuar. Quito: Abya Yala, [1999] 2005.

LUGONES, M. "Toward a Decolonial Feminism." Hypatia, 25(4 (Fall 2010)), p. 742-759, 2010.

MADER, Elke. Metamorfosis del Poder: Persona, mito y visión en la sociedad Shuar y Achuar. Quito: Abya Yala, 1999.

——. “Nua. Weibliche Identität in Mythos und Gesellschaft der Shuar und Achuar (Ecuador/Peru)”. In: DAVIS-SULIKOWSKI, U.; DIEMBERGER, H.; GINGRICH, A.; HELBLING, J. (eds). Körper, Religion und Macht: Sozialanthropologie der Geschlech- terbeziehungen. Frankfurt am Main: Campus, p. 331-355, 2001.

——. Von Liebe und Macht. Menschenbilder und Zaubereien in Amazonien. In: MADER, Elke; DABRINGER, Maria (eds.). Von der realen Magie zum magischen Realismus: Weltbild und Gesellschaft in Lateinamerika. Frankfurt am Main / Wien: Brandes & Apsel – Südwind. (Atención – Jahrbuch des Österreichischen Latein- amerika-Instituts, 2), p. 143-157, 1999.

——. Un discurso mágico del amor. Significado y acción en los hechizos shuar (anent), In: Los mundos de abajo y los mundos de arriba: Individuo y sociedad en las tierras bajas, en los Andes y más allá. Quito: Abya Yala. (pp. 51-80)

MOISALA, Pirkko. DIAMOND, Beverly; KOSKOFF, Ellen. Music and Gender. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2000.

NAPOLITANO, Emanuela. Shuar y ánent – El canto sagrado en la historia de un pueblo. Quito: Ediciones Abya Yala, 1988.

PELLIZZARO, Siro. Cantos de Amor de la esposa Achuar. Sucúa: Mundo Shuar, Series G, No. 2, 1977.

_____. Mitos Shuar- Tomo IV Tsunki. Quito: Abya Yala, 2014.

PERRUCHON, Marie. I Am Tsunki: Gender and Shamanism among the Shuar of Western Amazonia. Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Uppsala Studies in Cultural Anthropology 33, 2003.

TAYLOR, Anne Christine. “The Soul's Body and Its States: An Amazonian Perspective on the Nature of Being Human.” The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 2(2), p. 201-215, 1996.

THIELE, Kathrin. The Thought of Becoming: Gilles Deleuze’s Poetics of Life. Zürich- Berlin: diaphanes, 2008.

TSAMARAINT, Antun'; YOLANDA, Raquel, CHIRIAP INCHIT’ Victor Hilario. Tsentsak - la experiencia chamánica en el pueblo Shuar. Serie: MLAL Movimiento laici America Latina. Quito: Abya Yala, 1991.

TUHIWEI SMITH, Linda. Decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. London, Zed Books, 2012.

WALL HENDRICKS, Janet. “Power and Knowledge: Discourse and Ideological Trans- formation among the Shuar.” American Ethnologist, 15(2), p. 216-238, 1988.

WEST, Candace; ZIMMERMAN, Don H. “Doing Gender.” Gender & Society, 1, p. 125-151, 1987.

Downloads

Publicado

01-08-2024

Como Citar

BAMMER, N. “Becoming” Tsunki: The concept of change and transformation in the gender imagery of Shuar ánent. Somanlu: Revista de Estudos Amazônicos, Manaus, v. 23, n. 2, p. 138–156, 2024. DOI: 10.69696/somanlu.v23i2.14630. Disponível em: //periodicos.ufam.edu.br/index.php/somanlu/article/view/14630. Acesso em: 14 jul. 2025.