A people of stories in the forest of myth : the Yukuna of Miritiparaná

The title of this book plays on the importance myth has held as a focal theme in the study of Amazonian cultures. - The Yukuna, an Arawakan-speaking group of Colombian northwest Amazonia, in fact self-identify as ‘the People of the Stories’, looking upon themselves as custodians of a vast body of oral traditions inherited from their ancestors. They regularly narrate long myths and legends in public and ritualised settings where narrators gain honour and prestige by demonstrating their comprehensive knowledge of these. - In this book, Jon Schackt takes a holistic approach. Weaving extracts from recorded narratives ­together with his own ethnographic work on the Yukuna. He demonstrates how essential the narrated stories are, not only to the identity and self-understanding of this people, but to their kinship system and social structure as well. The Yukuna and their narrative tradition form two sides of the same coin.