Traditional Mayan healers, bone-setters, herbal curanderos, and spiritual guides or shamans, provide good physical and mental health options for poor Indigenous Guatemalans.
Tag: indigenous peoples
Ecuadorian Amazon Under Oil Assault to Service Chinese Debt
Ecuadorian state capitalism has sacrificed significant tracts of one of the planet’s most important biosphere reserves, Yasuni National Park in the Amazonian region, to a massive new oil drilling project. It threatens multiple indigenous territories and the area’s biodiversity and ecosystem integrity.
Preserve Newport Banning Ranch as Sacred Archaeological Site Genga
Newport Beach’s Banning Ranch, the site of a proposed mega commercial and residential development, is an extraordinary archaeological site. Once the site where an ancient Native American coastal village called Genga, a ritual and trading hub for both the Tongva and Acjachemen Native American Nations, existed for over a thousand years.
Rama People Fear End of Culture from Nicaraguan Interoceanic Canal
The indigenous Rama people of Nicaragua’s Atlantic Coast speak out in a new documentary against an inter-oceanic canal which threatens their ancestral land, language, and traditional culture.
“Embrace of the Serpent” Film: Journey of Healing and Ethnobotany
Ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes, one of the most important plant explorers of the 20th century, served as a key inspiration in a recent film called “Embrace of the Serpent.” In December 1941, Schultes entered the Amazon to study how indigenous peoples used plants for medicinal, ritual, and practical purposes. After nearly a decade of fieldwork, he made significant discoveries about the sacred hallucinogen ayahuasca. In total, Schultes would collect more than 24,000 species of plants including some 300 species new to Western science.
Berta Cáceres: Rebel Guardian of the Rivers, ¡Presente!
Berta Cáceres was assassinated by Honduran government-backed death squads on March 3. She fought for indigenous peoples’ power and for control over their own territories. She was not destined to die of old age. She spoke too much truth to power.
Postcommodity’s ‘Repellent Fence’ Land Art Spans the U.S. Border
Postcommodity is a collective of American Indian artists from different backgrounds and mediums, combining to create giant musical instrument installations, video, sound and sculpture. Their Repellent Fence installation floated Scare-Eye Bird Repellent balloons over the border between Arizona and Sonora.