The Shuar, also known as Jivaro, are an indigenous ethnic group that inhabits the Ecuadorian and Peruvian Amazonia. They are famous for their hunting skills and their tradition of head shrinking, known as tsantsa or tzantza.

The Shuar language belongs to the Jivaroan linguistic family and is spoken by over 50,000 people in the region. The Shuar are known for their skill in warfare, both in defending their territories and in offensive actions against external enemies. Currently, many Shuar live in communities organized around agriculture and hunting, although there are also some who work in mining and the timber industry.

Name

Shuar, in the Shuar language, means "people". The people who speak the Shuar language live in tropical rainforest between the upper mountains of the Andes, and in the tropical rainforests and savannas of the Amazonian lowlands, in Ecuador. Shuar live in various places — thus, the muraiya (hill) Shuar are people who live in the foothills of the Andes; the achu (swamp-palm) Shuar (or Achuar) are people who live in the wetter lowlands east of the Andes (Ecuador).

Shuar refer to Spanish-speakers as apach, and to non-Spanish and non-Shuar speakers as inkis. Europeans and European Americans used to refer to Shuar as "jívaros" or "jíbaros"; this word probably derives from the 16th century Spanish spelling of shuar (see Gnerre 1973), but has taken other meanings including "savage"; outside of Ecuador, jibaro has come to mean "rustic", and in Puerto Rico to describe a self-sufficient farmer. The Shuar are popularly depicted in a wide variety of travelogue and adventure literature because of Western fascination with their former practice of shrinking human heads (tsantsa).

Social organization and contacts with Europeans

From the time of first contact with Europeans in the 16th century, to the formation of the Shuar Federation in the 1950s and 1960s, Shuar were semi-nomadic and lived in separate households dispersed in the rainforest, linked by the loosest of kin and political ties, and lacking corporate kin-groups or centralized or institutionalized political leadership.

The center of Shuar life was a relatively autonomous household consisting of a husband, his wives (usually two), unmarried sons, and daughters. Upon marriage sons would leave their natal household, and sons-in-law would move in (see matrilocal residence). Men hunted and wove clothes; women gardened. In 1527, the Shuar defeated an incursion by the Inca armies of Huayna Capac.

Since women cultivated manioc and made chicha (manioc beer), which together provided the bulk of calories and carbohydrates in the Shuar diet, women's labor was crucial to Shuar biological and social life. In the late 19th century and early 20th century Europeans and Euro-Americans began trading manufactured goods, including shotguns, asking in return for shrunken heads. The result was an increase in local warfare, including head hunting, that has contributed to the perception of the Shuar as violent.

On 20 November 2018, Diana Atamaint, a Shuar woman, became the president of the National Electoral Council.

Jungle Commands Group (Iwias)

thumb|Soldiers of the Jungle Commands Group Iwias parading in Tena|300x300px

Many Shuar also serve in the Ecuadorian Army, and the Army has appropriated the perception of Shuar as "fierce warriors", forming elite "Iwia" units of Shuar soldiers (although all commissioned officers are non-Shuar). These units distinguished themselves in the 1995 Cenepa War between Ecuador and Peru. The name Iwia means "Jungle Demon"; it comes from the Shuar mythology: the Iwia is a feared demon that devours people.The motto of IWIAS is "Never defeated".

  • In James Rollins' novel Amazonia, Dr. Favre's Shuar mistress, Tshui, is described as a "witch" who concocts poisons, brews psychoactive tea, and maintains a large collection of shrunken heads. Her process of shrinking one such trophy, which she wears around her neck, is described in great detail.
  • Luis Sepúlveda's 1989 novel The Old Man Who Read Love Stories explores the Shuar people and their culture/traditions/beliefs as the main character is adopted/befriended by their people. The author was close friends with a Shuar union leader and built aspects of the story around the stories he told him about his way of life.
  • In the film Back from Eternity (1956) the Shuar (called Jivaros in film) attack the stranded crew in an unnamed South American country.

See also

  • Jivaroan peoples

References

  • Gnerre, Maurizio (1973). "Sources of Spanish Jívaro", in Romance Philology 27(2): 203–204. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  • Harner, Michael J. (1984). Jivaro: People of the Sacred Waterfalls Berkeley: University of California Press.
  • Karsten, Rafael (1935). The head-hunters of Western Amazonas: The life and culture of the Jibaro Indians of eastern Ecuador and Peru ([Finska vetenskaps-societeten, Helsingfors] Commentationes humanarum litterarum. VII. 1 Washington, D.C. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletins. ASIN B00085ZPFM)
  • Mader, Elke (1999). Metamorfosis del poder: Persona, mito y visión en la sociedad Shuar y Achuar. Abya-Yala.
  • Rubenstein, Steven (2006). "Circulation, Accumulation, and the Power of Shuar Shrunken Heads" in Cultural Anthropology 22(3): 357–399.
  • Rubenstein, Steven (2002). Alejandro Tsakimp: A Shuar Healer in the Margins of History Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. Google Books
  • Rubenstein, Steven (2001). "Colonialism, the Shuar Federation, and the Ecuadorian State," in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 19(3): 263–293.
  • Lowell, Karen (1994). "Ethnopharmacological Studies of Medicinal Plants, particularly Cyperus species, used by the Shuar Indians" Ph.D. Thesis, University of Illinois Health Science Center, Chicago, Illinois, 420 pp.
  • Organizations: Shuar grassroot organisation in the Pastaza region Fundación para Desarrollo Comunitario de Pastaza (FUNDECOIPA). Sustainable development and conservation projects in the Pastaza region.
  • Ethnologue report on Shuar
  • The Shuar (jibaro) people: History and information
  • Head Hunting: History of the Shuar
  • Project to support the Shuar initiated by the shuar with German support. Besides most of the information from CODENPE about the Shuar is translated here into the English language.
  • Photo gallery of Shuar & Jungles & Seed Art
  • Study Spanish in the Shuar Territory