OrientalismEdward Said (1979): the “Orient” as European invention, holding a special place of exotic-ness in Western imagination – the distinction of West and East:

• Academic: “Oriental” area studies• Style of Thought/Way of Life:

nature of Asian peoples, their thought, customs, and destiny

• Discourse: the west on top (positional superiority)

Tropicality

• The Tropics as Place, and as Place in the Western Imagination

• That unique variant of “Orientalism” that creates the tropics as primitive exotic

• Aristotle felt the tropics were uninhabitable• Tropical forest peoples as “nature folk”• State of nature: Hobbes and Rousseau• John Locke: “in the beginning all was

America”

• 1418–1460 Portugal's Prince Henry the Navigator sponsors exploration of Africa's coast. The Portuguese found valuable sources of pepper in West Africa. 1432 Portuguese discover the Azores, reach Cape Verde. 1445 Portuguese explore West Africa, reach Senegal, and reestablish slave trade. 1450 Henry establishes a Naval observatory for the teaching of navigation, astronomy, and cartography. 1455 A papal Bull recognizes the Portugese monopoly of African Exploration

• 1450 Invention of the printing press spurs wide distribution of navigation tables and ship plans (and Guns, Germs, and Steel).

• 1453 Turks overrun Constantinople (Istanbul), shutting off the overland trade route.

• 1455-1457 Cadamosto, Venetian sailor, explores West Africa including the Senegal and Gambia rivers

• 1470-84 Portuguese explorations discover Africa's Gold Coast and the Congo River.

• 1488 Portugese sailor Bartholomeu Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope.

• 1492 Christopher Columbus, a Genoese sailing for Ferdinand and Isabella of Castille & Aragorn, after sailing 69 days discovers America (the island of Dominica in the Bahamas, and Cuba), returns to Spain (1493). Second voyage to Dominica, Jamaica, Puerto Rico (1493–1496). Third voyage to Orinoco (1498). Fourth voyage to Honduras and Panama (1502–1504).  Dies in poverty 1506.

• 1494 The Treaty of Tordesillas divides the world between Spain and Portugal for the alleged purpose of spreading Christianity.

• 1497-98 Vasco da Gama rounds the Cape of Good Hope and reaches India. Establishes Portuguese colony in India (1502). 1505 Portugese trading posts are established on the Malabar coast.

• 1497 Italian John Cabot discovers Newfoundland for England

• 1499 Amerigo Vespucci discovers South America. 1500 Pedro Cabral claims Brazil for Portugal. 1501-1502 Vespucci explores the coast of Brazil, proposes that the land is a new continent, which is named America by German mapmaker Martin Waldseemuller in 1507

post-1650

1581-1640

Hans Staden

Jean de Léry (1536-1613)History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil,

Also Called America (1578).

France Antarctique, 1555-1567Huguenots and Calvinists (Protestants)Alliances with Tupinamba and Tamoio

ColumbusCannibal

Rousseau

Hobbes

Amazons

primitive

Homer

Green HellGarden of EdenSavage

El Dorado

Léryarchaic

Dog-snouted warriors

stone-age

Hobbes

Images of Amerindians

Yanomamo, 1960s and 70s, Portrayed as “The Fierce People” in the

Best selling ethnography

Fallen from grace, the one contrast in indigenous culture is corrupted by

Western society

Early contact with Xavante, central BrazilSaturday Evening Post, March 15, 1947

(first published: March 19, 1945 in Life Magazine)

“Uncontacted Tribe of the Amazon(May 2008)

Envira river region, Acré, Brazil (border with Peru)

“People who bought The Emerald Forest [on Amazon.com] also bought:Quest for Fire, Clan of the Cave Bear, The Mosquito Coast, Hell in the Pacific”

All the usual suspects:Bows

FeathersNakednessSavagery

Kaiapo medicine man, Brazil. Photo: Sue Wren

From www.mongabay.com/.../pictures/wren-shaman-1.html

(3/28/06) Warriors from the upper Xingú region of Brazil participating in the Quarup ceremony.

From Conservation International'sWilderness: Earth's Last Wild Places

© Russell Mittermeier

“Brazil Opens the West”

“Battling dense jungles, defying hostile Indians and angry insects, these few modern frontiersmen are breaking a path that will bring civilization to a wilderness empire that encompasses 2,000,000 square miles”

– The Saturday Evening Post, March 15, 1947

From “Lost Cities of the Amazon” in series “Digging for the Truth,History Channel, 4/24/06

• For 500 years, explorers have been searching the Amazon for traces of its fabled lost cities...now host Josh Bernstein searches for the most famous of them all. Following in the footsteps of explorer Colonel Percy Heath Fawcett, Josh treks through thick overgrown regions of the Amazon rainforest on the trail of the legendary "Lost City of Z". Along the way, he braves piranha-infested rivers, hacks through virgin jungle, and comes to terms with massive regions of deforestation. Finally, he joins up with the Kuikuro tribe. This warrior people will take him to investigate the archaeological remains of a huge forgotten city. Could it be the "Lost City of Z"? They'll teach him the ancient hunting, fishing, and horticultural techniques that allowed them to flourish long before European contact...and which may be the key to the rainforest's future.

“In the beginning all the World was America”

John Locke, 1690

O cacique Paulinho Paiakan, da reserva etica das matas tropicais, estupra uma estudante e permanece livre (1992)

Assassinato do lider seringueiro Chico Mendes em Xapuri, no Acre, provoca revolta no mundo inteiro (1989)

“THE SAVAGE,” and the Innocent

Eles marcaram a décadaVeja, 30 Anos, 1989-1998

http://veja.abril.com.br/30anos/p_084.html

“A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin, 2004)

Images of the Rainforest

• Amity Doolittle (Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies):

“Without deep reflection on the images and rhetoric that surround the rain forest, how can we really know what it is we are trying to ‘save’?” Is it the jungles of our imaginations teeming with exotic flora and fauna that must be protected? Or, is it the gardens, orchards, and forests of resident peoples that need our attention. And what are we trying to save it for? Is it to safeguard the vast repository of undiscovered pharmaceuticals, minerals, and oils? Or is it to comfort ourselves that the ‘lungs of the world’ are continuing to compensate for our extravagant lifestyles? More than just an entertaining exercise in deconstruction, probing what lies behind the iconic and simplified representations associated with rain forest preservation has significant consequences for its inhabitants and the resources it contains.”

(Review of Candice Slater’s “Searching for the Rainforest,” 2003, American Anthropologist)

“A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin, WorldWatch2004)

“A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin, 2004)

Cartoon: Khalil Bendib, from “Conservation at All Costs: How Industry-Backed Environmentalism

Creates Violent Conflict Among Indigenous Peoples”

By Shefa Siegel, Special Report to CorpWatchDecember 22nd, 2003