This Thesis Has Been Submitted in Fulfilment of the Requirements for a Postgraduate Degree (E.G
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This thesis has been submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for a postgraduate degree (e.g. PhD, MPhil, DClinPsychol) at the University of Edinburgh. Please note the following terms and conditions of use: This work is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights, which are retained by the thesis author, unless otherwise stated. A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author. The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author. When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given. Opening the Waiwai ewto: Indigenous social and spatial relations in Guyana Roy Elliott Oakley PhD Social Anthropology University of Edinburgh 2018 Declaration I declare that this thesis has been composed solely by myself and that no part of it has been submitted in any previous application for a degree. Except where I state otherwise by reference or acknowledgment, the work presented is entirely my own. Signature: Roy Elliott Oakley August 2018 Edinburgh, UK 3 For Sarah In memoriam Wachana Yaymochi 5 Abstract This thesis presents an indigenous analysis of social and spatial relations in southern Guyana through the histories, perspectives and practices of people in Masakenyarï, considered by its approximately 250 residents to be a Waiwai village. It explores contemporary indigenous relations to the environment and environmental NGOs, the state, and various outsiders in Guyana. The chapters examine the multiple ways in which people in Masakenyarï understand and act within broader political and economic processes, which are analytically framed through Waiwai ideas about the desired and potentially dangerous relation between exteriority and interiority. Central to this account of social and spatial relations is the Waiwai ewto, the village or ‘place-where-people-live’. Masakenyarï became an Amerindian Protected Area in 2007, partnering with an international NGO and later with the Guyanese government. I show how for people in Masakenyarï making their ewto includes everyday household and communal processes but also establishing the protected area, seeking expertise outside the village, and building relations with the state. Themes such as leadership, gender, development, exchange, and identity are explored to elaborate interiority and exteriority as dynamic spatial but also conceptual relations. I pay particular attention to the ways that people in Masakenyarï frame their participation in environmental conservation and increased connection to the state as active and agentive. Taken together, the chapters demonstrate the persisting importance of the exterior – which includes state, NGO and other itinerant actors – as a source of value for Waiwai people for the village-based livelihoods that they desire. Rooted in the anthropology of Latin America and indigenous Amazonia, the thesis speaks to broader questions about indigenous ideas of living well, both in relation to village sociality and contemporary indigenous livelihoods amidst large-scale political and economic transformation. 7 Lay Summary This thesis explores the lives of people in Masakenyarï, a village (or ewto) in a remote, forested area of southern Guyana. This indigenous community, considered by its inhabitants to be a Waiwai village, operates their titled lands in the Guiana Shield rainforests of South America as a protected area. By focusing on the viewpoints and experiences of people there, these chapters show how ideas about living in a village – a place where people want to ‘live well’ together – shape relationships to environmental conservation organisations, the market economy, and the national government. For people in Masakenyarï, living in their ewto fundamentally includes seeking out and building long-term relationships with people outside the community, rather than living in an isolated or bounded place. In broad terms, this thesis argues that a variety of people, materials, and types of knowledge that are ‘outside’ the village are important to living ‘inside’ of it. These parts of the ‘outside’ are valuable for people’s livelihoods in Masakenyarï, which require ongoing subsistence farming, hunting, and fishing as well as access to money, trade goods, and services like state healthcare and education. In this context, environmental conservation offers the community a pathway to increase access to wages and ‘development’ while also controlling who can enter protected area lands. A longstanding interest in difference makes people in Masakenyarï resilient in the face of large-scale political and economic transformation. But this process does not occur without concerns about dangers and risks. This thesis argues that part of ‘living well’ is balancing between the benefits of deeper connections to NGOs and nation-states and their side effects. 9 Table of Contents Declaration .............................................................................................................................. 3 Abstract ................................................................................................................................... 7 Lay Summary ........................................................................................................................... 9 Table of Contents .................................................................................................................. 11 List of Illustrations ................................................................................................................. 13 Note on Pronunciation .......................................................................................................... 15 Glossary of Waiwai Terms..................................................................................................... 17 Acronyms ............................................................................................................................... 19 Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................... 21 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 25 Livelihoods in the Waiwai ewto ......................................................................................... 27 Key Themes ........................................................................................................................ 31 Conservation and indigenous peoples ........................................................................... 32 Indigenous exchange and market economies ................................................................ 36 Indigeneity and nation-states ........................................................................................ 39 Indigenous Amazonian sociality and spatiality .............................................................. 42 Ethnographic Context ........................................................................................................ 45 Geographic and historical context ................................................................................. 47 Religion and Christian missionization ............................................................................ 49 Waiwai language and identity ....................................................................................... 51 Fieldwork Context, Methods, and Ethics ........................................................................... 53 Chapter Outline .................................................................................................................. 58 Chapter One: Masakenyarï and the Kanashen Community-Owned Conservation Area....... 63 Birthing a village ................................................................................................................. 65 Making a protected area .................................................................................................... 72 Becoming itore ................................................................................................................... 79 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................ 85 Chapter Two: Demarcated pens, dependent pets: Interiority and exteriority in the protected area ....................................................................................................................... 89 Wokpa and wamtotopo ..................................................................................................... 92 Interiority and care ............................................................................................................ 98 Exteriority and exclusion .................................................................................................. 104 Conclusions ...................................................................................................................... 110 11 Chapter Three: ‘So we want puranta this time’: Knowing and transforming money.......... 113 Histories of money and exchange .................................................................................... 116 ‘How come the money stopped?’ ...................................................................................