Borders and identities: the Manchineri and the Jaminawa in the triple border Brazil-Bolivia-Peru

Abstract

This article deals with the vicissitudes of people known today as Manchineri and Jaminawa, inhabitants of border regions of the department of Pando, in Bolivia, Madre de Dios in Peru and Acre state in Brazil. It seeks to trace their connections and the relevance of their historical identity as people of Arawak and Pano linguistic and cultural affiliation, to point the process of involvement by the expansion of the national societies of Bolivia, Peru and Brazil, driven by the exploitation of rubber in the region, and finally to show their presently defined political identity and their conditions of life that were shaped by these processes. But even if it is shaped by the involvement and the standardizations of the national territory allocated at national borders, imposing landmarks “legitimate” for the life of its inhabitants, we point out how these indigenous people are intent on equipping try to use these legal and sociocultural parameters that were intended to subdue them.