What is causing the extinction of the biggest indigenous group in the Amazon region?

The Yanomami are a relatively isolated ethnic group in South America, consisting of around 35,000 individuals and distributed across approximately 250 isolated villages in the Amazon rainforest on the border between Venezuela and Brazil. Despite their large population, they are one of the Amazonian peoples at risk of extinction due to various past and present phenomena, such as tropical diseases like malaria, precarious living conditions, malnutrition, fishing, livestock, and illegal mining taking place in their natural area. According to Brazilian government estimates, 570 Yanomami children have died in the last four years alone. This is a tragic situation that also affects other isolated Amazon tribes, but on a smaller scale. The Yanomami area is rich in natural resources, which has attracted many adventurers to extract and trade them illegally, leading to environmental degradation and the destruction of entire settlements. Additionally, their limited contact with other civilizations has allowed the spread of diseases to which they have not been prepared to face, causing countless Yanomami to die from diseases and plagues. The Yanomami are also victims of violence within their own ranks and have a long history of internal conflicts. These are just some of the issues faced by the Yanomami ethnic group, which we will explore further in upcoming discussions.

In Brazil, human settlements are located between the states of Amazonas and Roraima, which are two of the 26 states and federal districts that make up the country. These political administrative divisions are located in the Northwestern Brazilian region, and together, their territorial areas are approximately 695,000 square miles in size. However, the area they occupy is only 3861 square miles. The capital of Amazonas is Manaus, which has nearly 2 million inhabitants, making it the most populous urban agglomeration in the Amazon region. The capital of Roraima is Boa Vista, which houses about 300,000 inhabitants and is the only capital of a Brazilian Federal entity located north of the equator. On the Venezuelan side of the border, Yanomami Villages are located in the Indigenous state of Amazonas, one of the 23 federal entities that make up Venezuela. This territory entity recognizes Spanish and Amerindian languages as official languages, as it is one of the Venezuelan areas with the largest number of indigenous people. In this territory of almost 77,220 square miles, the Yanomami population represents almost a fifth of the total indigenous population. The Yanomami both in Venezuela and Brazil occupy one of the largest indigenous jungle territories in the world. Dozens of different indigenous ethnic groups, besides the Yanomami, also inhabit these political entities, making it an important ethnic and cultural reserve for humanity.

The Yanomami live in chobonos, which make up their villages. It consists of a circular structure surrounding an open space for recreation in the middle, and their life is communal. Within the structure, they build partitions for families. The term Yanomami comes from the Italian Salesian missions that were responsible for the Catholic missions in the Yanomami region. It is also said to come from the word Yanomami Tepe, which means human beings. This expression contrasts with the concepts of yarrow, which are hunting animals, nepe, which means enemy or foreigner, and yai, which refers to invisible or nameless beings.

The Yanomami's livelihood is based on hunting, gathering, and fishing. Of these three elements, hunting provides less than one-tenth of their food, but it is considered a prestigious activity within the tribe, and its members enjoy the moments when they consume meat. They develop large gardens at the expense of reducing their natural surroundings, and their agricultural production is primarily based on yams, plantains, and taro.

The Yanomami have developed botanical knowledge enabling them to grow crops, build houses, prepare natural medicines, and create other useful artifacts for their daily lives. Since the Amazonian soil is not very fertile, they move their crops to nearby lands after a few years to take advantage of the few nutrients present in these new soils. This condition has turned them into a nomadic people frequently moving within the Amazon rainforest, and their settlements are often not permanent.

Due to their subsistence agricultural activities and knowledge of their natural environment, they are self-sufficient and do not need contact with the outside world. Thus, their isolation is not only from other civilizations but also from other native tribes. Another recurring food source for the Yanomami is larvae, and they have discovered mechanisms to increase larvae reproduction and make them available for consumption. The traditional diet of this ethnic group is very low in salt, and their blood pressure is among the lowest of any demographic group in the world, which has sparked the interest of the scientific community to study the possible link between low sodium intake and hypertension.

The Yanomami people have a limited amount of music which is basic and ancient, and it consists of pentatonic and tritonic scales. They use instruments like the Shaman's sacred maraca and the buzzing stick to imitate animal sounds. Both individual and collective singing are allowed. The Yanomami people are known for their short height, with an average of only four feet and 11 inches tall. The German ethnologist Theodore Coke Grundberg was one of the first researchers to study this Latin American ethnic group in the early 20th century, and later expeditions were carried out in Brazilian territory. However, the Yanomami people are isolated and not easily accessible, which makes research difficult, contributing to the scarcity of information about them.

The Yanomami divide tasks according to gender, with men responsible for hunting, clearing the jungle for crops, and performing physically demanding tasks, while women tend to the crops, gather in the forest, and create handicrafts. Both men and women can fish using a poison called kirare, or fish during tribal fishing trips, making their practices egalitarian. Women give birth in the jungle or near the village, and children stay close to their mothers during their first years of life. The practice of infanticide is one of their traditions that can threaten the survival of their people, especially when a baby is born deformed, when twins or triplets are born, or when births are premature.

Polyandry and polygamy are accepted in several Yanomami villages, where a woman can be married to several men at the same time, or a man can be married to several women. There is no specific marriage ritual; it is formalized by taking down the hammock and placing it where it should be next to the couple. Yanomami mythology is very rich and well-preserved, describing the origins of the firmament and the teppwi, as well as the exploits of Makunaema, one of their main deities.

To celebrate their magical and traditional rituals, the Yanomami consume the Viola plant, which has hallucinogenic properties, during healing rituals, communicating with their ancestors and learning about their future. Only men are included in this practice. The Yanomami also practice cremation, and they make a drink with the ashes, which is believed to transfer the spirit and good energies of the deceased to those who consume it. The ashes are stored in a gourd and the ritual can be repeated indefinitely until they run out.

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