Puyo Runa

The Andean nation of Ecuador derives much of its revenue from petroleum that is extracted from its vast Upper Amazonian rain forest, which is home to ten indigenous nationalities. Norman E. Whitten Jr. and Dorothea Scott Whitten have lived among and studied one such people, the Canelos Quichua, for nearly forty years. In Puyo Runa, they present a trenchant ethnography of history, ecology, imagery, and cosmology to focus on shamans, ceramic artists, myth, ritual, and political engagements. Canelos Quichua are active participants in national politics, including large-scale movements for social justice for Andean and Amazonian people. Puyo Runa offers readers exceptional insight into this cultural world, revealing its intricacies and embedded humanisms.

DIVAnalyzes Latin American and Caribbean folk art from a feminist perspective, considering the issue of gender in the production and circulation of popular art produced by women./div

Reflecting a global interest in the topics of well-being, happiness, and the good life, this book explores local notions of public wealth in indigenous Amazonia. The contributors place particular importance in how indigenous views of wealth are linked to the creation of strong, productive, and moral individuals and collectivities, providing thought-provoking new approaches to understanding wealth in non-capitalist, kin-based societies.