2024-02-09 10:53:00
It was with the message “never again a Brazil without us” that, on January 30th, six members of the National Articulation of Indigenous Women Warriors of Ancestrality (Anmiga) met at the Floresta no Centro space, in São Paulo (SP), to a conversation circle in which they shared, with more than 50 people, the importance of supporting the struggle of indigenous women to advance the protection of forests and the rights of indigenous peoples.
“We need to reforest minds to heal the earth, we need to village all possible spaces with our bodies-territories and we need to be increasingly together with society”, emphasized the executive director of Anmiga, Braulina Baniwa, about the importance of the conversation circle, which also included the participation of co-founders Joziléia Kaingang, Shirley Krenak, Jaqueline Kuña Aranduha, Lucimara Patté, as well as Keila Guajajara, responsible for communication at Anmiga.
Left to right: Braulina Baniwa, Keila Guajajara, Joziléia Kaingang, Jaqueline Kuña Aranduha, Shirley Krenak, and Lucimara Patté during the “Indigenous Women in Struggle” Talk Round|Tatiane Klein/ISA
Mediated by journalist Bianca Santana, the event was part of the agenda of Anmiga representatives at the Instituto Socioambiental (ISA) office for the joint production of the second edition of the Map of Indigenous Women’s Organizations – which, in its first edition, in 2020, recorded the existence of 85 indigenous women’s organizations, in 21 states of the country.
Scheduled to be released in 2024, the new edition will bring together updated information on the mapping of organizations, departments, institutes, associations and groups of the indigenous women’s movement. Organization registrations can be made until February 15th in this link.
Female protagonism
Starting the conversation, Joziléia Kaingang brought a reflection on strengthening the indigenous women’s network based on her doctoral thesis, Articulation of Indigenous Women in Brazil: on the move and moving networks. She revealed that indigenous women have a long history of articulation, but that it was only in 2021 that Anmiga was formalized, by women from the six Brazilian biomes – Amazon, Atlantic Forest, Cerrado, Caatinga, Pampa and Pantanal –, seeking to strengthen the fight for good living and for indigenous territories, based on the protagonism of women and the valorization of their traditional knowledge.
Indigenous women from the Rio Negro Delegation during the III March of Indigenous Women | Webert da Cruz Elias/ISA
Joziléia explained that, at Anmiga, everyone starts from one place, one community, one family, to then integrate this expanded network. “We expand, but we return and it is important to return so that we can connect again and strengthen ourselves spiritually”, she adds. Delving deeper into her research and experience, she also considers the challenges faced by its members, who need continuous and daily dedication, leaving their families to be part of this movement and working collectively with several indigenous women so that the network reaches more and more in the territories.
As an example of this, she recalled the construction of the Indigenous Women’s March. Organized by Anmiga, the March reached its third edition in 2023, bringing together more than eight thousand people on the streets of Brasília. Joziléia Kaingang also said that this moment, by bringing together all these biome women in the political capital of Brazil, also helped to spark urgent debates. “Anmiga today is in various spaces, within the Executive Branch, the Legislature, but she is also on the ground in the territory, stamping her foot on the ground, shaking the maraca, singing and maintaining our spirituality”, she concluded.
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Braulina Baniwa brought to the public a little more about the process of building the women’s mobilization, which culminated in the formalization of the organization. “It is a very big challenge to bring this strength from all the women who walk with us and, at the same time, strengthen this journey of demarcating spaces with our bodies-territories, reaching out to humanity and asking for respect for our diversity of bodies that are present in several places”, he declared.
Regarding Anmiga’s internal organization, Braulina explained that it is done through the categories: earth-women; seed women; root women; and water women. Together, they form an advisory and deliberative council, in a format that, in their words, is characterized as a tree that creates seeds and generates other seeds, bearing fruit.
Thus, she defines root women as those who are in the territories, who articulate and protect theirs through their voices or participation in a collective organization. The seed women, in turn, are those who mobilize in state articulation spaces and are those chosen by women as a local reference. Earth-women are the co-founders and represent themselves on the national and international political scene, while water-women are those who act and defend the rights of indigenous women internationally.
“Anmiga comes with this process in an unprecedented and revolutionary way, in which all indigenous women are and need to be respected based on their diversity. It doesn’t matter if I don’t speak Portuguese well, I have science, I carry this knowledge with me, this body-territory that moves and transits between spaces also asks for help for the demarcation of its lands, for food sovereignty and the fight for good living without violence for women”, concluded Braulina.
Keila Guajajara recalled the Caravana das Originárias, a journey carried out by Anmiga in 2022 throughout the country, and brought to the debate the importance of guaranteeing the presence of indigenous women in the media and the responsibility of telling these stories, amplifying their voices and showing that the Their struggle is also important. “If you entered the territories, if you could hear half of what we hear when we carry out the caravan, half of what our women tell us. It is a knowledge that no school, no university, and no place will pass by because it is a wisdom of life, an ancestral wisdom”, he added.
Lucimara Patté, from the people Hocklenspoke about the thesis of the “Temporal Framework” that his Earth had, Ibirama-La Klãnõ, as the center of discussions. For her, the thesis aims to steal and destroy territories. “The territory we protect with our bodies. We fight because our territory is our body and when this thesis becomes law, we have to rethink, recalculate, but we continue in this fight, because even before the thesis itself, we have the constitution in our favor”, he argues. . She also highlights the importance of bringing debate about the thesis in different spaces. “We need to echo our voices so they can be heard.”
Jaqueline Kuña Aranduha, from the Guarani Kaiowá people, in turn, brought to the debate the importance of union with other social movements, especially at a time of climate collapse in Brazil and the world. “Climate issues are not just the responsibility of indigenous peoples, it is not just the responsibility of governments, but of each individual. So, unions are fundamental, because if we are not connected, if the struggles are isolated, we cannot move forward”, she explained.
In the same direction, Shirley Krenak highlighted the role of indigenous women in combating climate issues. “We are the healer of the earth, but this responsibility to heal the Earth is not ours alone., because it is not just us indigenous people who drink water, who eat land. So the fight to preserve the Earth, preserve biodiversity and preserve biomes belongs to all of us”, he defended.
Follow the struggle of indigenous women in @anmigaorg!
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