~ Proposed Awajún Cultural Center ~
To Save and Protect
Awajún Traditional Knowledge
Awajún Traditional Knowledge
The Awajún culture is tightly woven into their ecosystems, depending upon them for everything: food, water, medicine, material goods, and spiritual well-being.
The accumulated knowledge of this oral culture, spanning thousands of years of coexistence with the forest, lives in the minds and bodies of the elders.
These women and men may be master herbalists, ceremonial leaders, storytellers, bone setters, law-givers, or shamans.
They function much like the libraries of western culture, preserving and transmitting knowledge from generation to generation.
'House of Our Wise Men'
"Inia Muunta Jeé": A project to save Awajún Culture.
Modern life, with its temptations and conflicts, can penetrated deeply into Awajún communities and disrupted the traditional chains of succession. When elders die without passing on what they know, thousands of years of information can be lost, forever: knowledge of the forest fades, histories vanish, languages and dances are forgotten. Without their cultural memory, communities begin to lose coherence.
Our efforts begin in the field. We ask our partners what they want, what they need, and what they envision for their future. They identify which lands are most important to them, and they tell us what they need to protect them. From these discussions, we develop strategic courses of action that lead us together towards our goals.
