Strange Enemies

In 1956, in the Brazilian state of Rondocirc;nia, near the border with Bolivia, a group of Warirs" Indians experienced their first peaceful contact with whites: Protestant missionaries and agents from the national governmentrs"s Indian Protection Service. On returning to their villages, the Warirs" announced, "We touched their bodies!" The whites reported to their people that "the regionrs"s most warlike tribe has entered the pacification phase!" First published in Brazil,Strange Enemiesis a vivid ethnographic account of the first encounters between groups with radically different worldviews.During the 1940s and 1950s, white rubber tappers interested in Warirs" lands raided their villages, shooting and killing sleeping victims. Those massacres prompted the Warirs" to initiate a period of intense retaliatory warfare. The national government and religious organizations stepped in, seeking to "pacify" the Indians. Aparecida Vilaccedil;a was able to interview both Warirs" and non-Warirs" people who participated in these encounters, and she shares their firsthand narratives of the dramatic events. Taking the Warirs" perspective as its starting point,Strange Enemiescombines a detailed examination of the cross-cultural encounters with analyses of classical ethnological themes such as kinship, shamanism, cannibalism, warfare, and mythology. It is a major contribution to the recent anthropological debates about Amazonian indigenous peoples and to the understanding of their present-day situation.