Brazilian Native Americans attack farmers over ancestral lands.
I will admit that I’m not very familiar with Brazil’s Native Americans…but based on this article it would seem that their braves are just as angry as ours are.
“They’re not going to die like some endangered species without putting up a fight,” says Zelik Trajber, chief physician in the nearby Dourados reservation. “If they could organize, they’d be a serious problem.”
tvst wrote:
eh… dude…. brazilian native americans? doesn’t that sound a bit weird to you? you can blame the english language for not distinguishing “indian” from the americas (”índio” in portuguese) from from “indian” from india (”indiano” in portuguese). alas, not all is lost: i believe the term “amerindian” is not yet deprecated:
http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=amerindian
Posted on 16-May-07 at 7:50 pm | Permalink
speedball wrote:
So which way do they want it, politically correct or not? They don’t want to be called Savages, or even Injuns. I’m sticking with Native American.
Posted on 16-May-07 at 9:49 pm | Permalink
tvst wrote:
Or you may find out what they call themselves and use that. In Brazil most of the natives are Tupi or Guarani. But most times they just call themselves “Índio”, like everyone else. Just like white-skinned people are called “branco”, black-skinned are called “preto” or “negro” (which some even prefer), east-asians are called “amarelo”, and all the mixes (”mestiços”) have names “mulato”, “caboclo”, “mameluco”, etc. Then, of course, there are gradations, like “mulato claro”, etc. Since, genetically, most brazilians are mixes, though, we usually just talk about skintone or appearance — not origin like americans do. Which is why most black brazilians would not like to be called “African Brazilians”: because they feel they’re as brazilian as everyone else. Regarding origin, many of the “índios” living in tribes are of mixed origin themselves. That doesn’t make them more or less “índio” for all anyone is concerned.
In any case, I was just taking a shot at the ridiculousness of political correctness, as a billion people have done before me. The term “Brazilian Native American” is just a tad ridiculous.
Posted on 18-May-07 at 10:26 am | Permalink