VOLUME G8 NUMBER 4Current Anthropology Volume 48, Number 4, August 2007 Feasting on People Eating Animals and Humans in Amazonia by Carlos Fausto “7 A problem of particular concern in the literature on animistic systems is the status of hunting and. food consumption in societies whose ontology is not founded upon a distinction between humans and animals, Ifanimals are people, how can one distinguish between everyday eating and cannibalism? Commensality is a vector for producing kinship among humans, a mechanism which depends on the transformation of the animal prey into an object devoid of intentionality. Indigenous techniques for desubjectivizing prey are based on a specific conception of the person that is not reducible to @ simple body-and-soul dualism. A new theoretical formulation for this partibility shedslight on warfare and funerary anthropophagy in Amaaonia, Our body is, after all, only a society constructed out of many souls E Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil In Lua-do-Chta, there is no word 10 say “poor.” One says “orphan,” This is true misery: to have no ki Mia Couto, Unt rio chamado tempo, uma casa chamada terra Ever since Darwin, the process through which our animal na- ture became human history has captured the Western imagi- nation, This process is often held to have decided, once end forall, our psychological constitution and the development of government and society. The role of hunting and, more gen- erally, predation has been central t conceptualizing this process and its consequences. The predominant view is that predation was one of the key forces in the process of humanization, Climbing down from the trees to wander the savannas, our ancestors were required to hunt or dle, rom this frst (misstep the rest of human history follows, from technology to social ‘organization and gender relations (Cartmill 1993). This legacy isalso held to explain our supposed inclination toward vielence, matking warfare the end result of the very process through which we became cultured humans (Washburn and Lancaster 1968; ‘Tiger and Fox 1971). An alternative view holds, on the contrary, that we have never been unrestrained predatorsand thet human, evolution was shaped more by opportunistic scavenging (Bin- Carlos Fausto is Associate Professor in the Graduate Program in Social Anthropology, Departmen of Anthropology, Museu Nacions Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Quinta da Bos Vista sn, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil 20. 940-040 (cfausto@terra.com br). This pa per was submited 30 1X O$ and accepted 13 XIE 06 ford 1981; Shipman 1983) or the sharing of meat (Isaac 1978, Isaac and Crader 1983) than by hunting. But in ether case the way our ancestors got along with the task of meat eating is held to define our basic constitution as persons and our sociality (se Stanford 1999; Stanford and Bunn 200%; Stiner 2002) In this article I intend to explore this set of images from the perspective of a different tration of thought, one which de- ‘eloped in the Americas thousands of yeas before the arrival of modern Europeans and is stil very much alive today. This tradition emerged from quit distinct ontological assumptions, leading to different conceptualizations of te relation between predation and food consumption and to different socal prac tices. Amerindian ontologies are not predicated upon the divide between nature and culture (or subject and objet) that plays 4 foundational role in the modern Wester tradition, tn Ama- «rindian contexts, the relationships between humans and non: Jhutmans take precedence over the nstrumental action ofhuman beings upon nature, and therefore the huating of animals im: mediately invokes a wider field of sococosmaic zelations. From the pioneering works of Hallowell (1960) on Ojibwa ontology to Ingole’s ecological phenomenology (1986, 20006), Philippe Descola’s socialized nature and schemes of practice (1986, 2005), and Viveizos de Castro's perspetvism (19982), 4 new way of looking at the relationship between humans and nonhumans has emerged. The fundamental premise shared by these approaches is that, in Amerindian (and North Eurasian) ontologies, intentionality and reflexive consciousness aze not exclusive attributes of humanity but potentially available to ll beings of the cosmos. In other words, animals, plants, gods, and spirits are also potentially persons and can occupy asubject, positon in their dealings with humans, This ontological in- distinction gives rise to a series of ethnographic and theoretical (© 2007 by The WenserGren Foundation fr Astiropolgisl Reseach, Al ight reered OO} 308/207 4804-0901000|498 problems, including the one that concerns us here: the status of the hunt and food consumption. ifthe predation of animals is equivalent to illing people, would hunting not immeclately _merge into warfare? And if both these phenomena are inscribed within a field of social relations between subjects imbued with intentionality, would not fed consumption necessarily slipinto cannibalism? ‘These questions have been posed, in these or other terms, by the contemporary literature on so-called animistic systems, ‘8 concept that has arisen fiom its Tylorean ashes since the revision of the core notions of nature and culture (Descola 1992, 1996; Bird-David 1999; Stringer 1999). Some of these studies aim to establish a clear rupture between hunting and warfare, Bid-David and Ingol, for example, characterize the relations between humans and nonhumans in hunter-gatherer societies as essentially nonviolent. These societies, they argue, are founded upon a “cosmic economy of sharing” (Bird-David 1990) in which the cardinal value is trust, defined as a peculiar mixture of dependency and autonomy involving positive and rnoncocrcive relations (Ingold 2000, 69-70). Within this par- adigm, hunting emerges as sharing between humans and an- mals and is thereby opposed to belligerent relations between humans. But just how sidespread is this paradigm? Does it apply to all animistic systems or all hunter-gatherers? Since I lack the necessary expertise to address the problem from such a general standpoint, my geographic scope is much narrower it com- prehends Lowland South America, especially Amazonia, which is inhabited today by more than 300 different indigenous peo- ples speaking about 250 different languages.” Most of these peoples are horticulturalists and hunters, relying on noninten- sive food production and the procurement of animal meat through hunting and Gshing, The hunt plays a centeal role in their cosmologies (Viveiros de Castro 1996a, 194). Itis possible, however, that more sedentary and agricultural societies, with ‘nuniction). On this topic, se also Vise (2002, 363), 505 ‘oni girl in seclusion after her first menses and the Parakand ‘man in posthomicidal seclusion In the first case, the giel runs the risk of being attracted by an “animal-man” who wil take her with him; fur will begin to grow on her body and she will become a threat to human beings. The Parakan killer, like the father in couvade, cannot go hunting. The fate of anyone who distespects this prohibition is explained in a myth: A man in seclusion had to go hunting because his son was hungry and no one in the village would hunt for him, He spotted a herd ‘of wild pigs and began to kill them. But he was alone, and after he had shot the last of his arrows he sought refuge in the branches ofa tee. He was later brought dawn by the wild pigs, who took him away forever (Fausto 2001, 313). This myth begins with th refusal of kinship (the villagers do not recognize the child as a relative and deny him food) and ends with pec- caries capturing the Kill. & link is established between the inital negation of a reletionship (among humans) and the production of a second relationship (between humans and an- imal). A similar idea is present among the Kayabi: a person ‘who is mistreated by her relatives is exposed to the risk of having her soul kidnepped by spits that will transform ft into 8 famitiar (Oakdale 1998). The Kashinawé clita that “sad or ‘angry people, unsatisfied with their relationship with close kin ‘oF spouses, are said to be prone to lend an ear to yun “spiit”] callings at night, and then disappear as they ‘seep walk’ into the forest” (Lagrow 1998, 45). ‘This process of disafection directed by kinflkis thus equiv- alent 0 a pathology. Writing ebout the Jvaroan Achar, Taylor (nd) shows thatthe erosion ofthe web of relations constituting the person induces “a kind of sociological anemia that translates into symptoms of illness and claims of being an orphan, a state that is tantamount to being sick.” Disease experienced as or- phanhood reveals the double movement consisting ofthe rup- ture of kinship relations and their re-creation elsewhere. The agent of disease—that unwanted metamorphosis—is an other subject that wants to produce its own kinfoll and acts out of| jealousy and desire, seducing and preying upon other peoples. Seen fiom this side as diseae-disaffetion, the transformation is perceived from the other side as predation-affection. The sifference between disease and warfare is not one of process but one of point of view. If potential competition exists between different kinds of peoples (human or othervvise) over the persons one wants to fabricate as kin and if refusing kinship paves the way for the production of a new relationship thet passes theough a meta- morphosis, why should the postpartum, postmenarche, and pposthomicide conditions be surrounded by interdictions? The danger seems to derive from the fact that a metamorphosis is already in progress, one evinced by the smell of blood. But ‘what metamorphosis is this, and what risk is involved? tn the case of homicide, the key issue is the dcection of familiari- zation: instead of controlling the victim, the killer runs the risk of being controlled by it, definitively assuming its per- spective. Because of this, the killer’s relatives place him in seclusion, forcing him to focus on his relationship with the506 victim and prohibiting food and activities which might lead him to interact with other subjects and go astray. They also insistently remind him that he is kin and pot an enemy.'* ‘Therefore we can say that while the killer familiarizes the victim, his kin refamiliarize both himself and his victim, who are now one and the same, The direction of familiarization is also at stake in the couvade, As Rival says, birth is part of “a wider process of gradual incorporation” (1998, 626). What starts as part of a generic pool of subjectivity (or soul-stuff) has to be made into a specific kind of person through acts of feeding and caring, And here again certain relations must bee placed in focus while others have to be blocked. Finally, in the case of the menarche, there is no appropriation of a nnew subject (there is no victim and no baby). There is instead the production of a condition that will enable a woman to be an active receptacle for a nonvisible transformation (ges- tation), which serves es an analogical model for another trans- formation, that of the killer, which is also objectifiable only in its external manifestations (chants and names provided by the victim and transferzed to the community).”” In sum, seclusion isa way of controlling processes of trans formation, preventing them from taking the weong direction, This is « matter not of obviating them but of trying to impede other beings from appropriating this potential for movement. ‘The numerous food restrictions applicable during seclusion suggest that eating is a particularly vulnerable activity since it ean quickly be converted into a social relationship between, subjects, Shamanic and culinary treatments are not sufficient by themselves to transform alimentary consumption into @ secure relationship between an active subject and an inert object there is always a trace of activity and subjectivity left in the animal, and therefore, in some circumstances, one must abstain from almost everything" 16, Among de Patan dhe kill’ sister wil ask him to hand over «bow (not, howeres the one aed inthe homicide) to his brother Jaw so tha the later my bring her game mest He thu furnishes the inate for his fine fo continue to satis his sister's desire For meat, ‘ecogaizing the relationship which unites them. Somtimes, however, the teemy crass the lle to lve consciousness (pikeym) and tum againt his oun kin (Fausto 2001, 315-17). For other eamples of tis danger ‘of alienation, see Vives de Casta (1992, 245), and Sterpin (1993, 48). 17. On pregnancy and mensiuation #s a metaphor forthe hiler’s “tate daring seclusion, ee Taylor (1984, 82), Menget (1999), Conklin (41989, 239-415 20018), and Fausto {2001 47). 18. Thisargument doesnot eecount forthe nemerous food restrictions ‘nhose native explanation concerns the transferal of a characeistic of the food tothe person in seclusion without recouse to the agentve ‘capacity ofthe imal or plant The Parakena, for example, establish a ‘merely analogical relationship berwoen the quelies of the animal plant fd its effect onthe Killer in seclusion (If he eats yam, his buttocks Shrinks if he eats collated peccary, hs testicles grov, and soon) (Fausto 201, 308-5), These prohibitions elate toa more general operation: the snaldgical transference of qualities from one being to another, which i Sfaacteristic of ritual symbolism (see for instance, Tambish 1985 61-77). In the Amazonian context however is argae that these are ‘eases of “specie lteration, in which only part ofthe body is tans forased into the animal or plant consumed. Current Anthropology Volume 48, Number 4, August 2007 From Food to Person Food in Amazonia cannot always be simply food. While there are times when prohibitions are rife, there are others when processes of transformation must be triggered by the con- sumption of prohibited animals. These animals are normally predators and tend to be consumed raw or roasted. In order to develop the dreaming capacity of young men, Parakand adults used to give them selected roasted parts of giant otter, ‘an animal which many Amazonian peoples consider to be & sort of aquatic jaguar (Chaumeil and Chaurneil 1992, 275 Fausto 2004, 174). KashinawS men used to eat the raw heart and tongue ofthe boa constrictor (while women ate the eyes) 50 as to acquire its capacities (Lagrou 1998, 62). Among the ‘Yagua, a man who kills a jaguar is supposed to eat its still beating heart to acquire strength and courage (Jean-Pierre ‘Chaumeil, personal communication). The Avila Runa are re- ported to ingest the bile of jaguars and harpy eagles to increase their hunting prowess and become were-jaguars: “As were- jaguars they become powerful in life and their soul goes to inhabit the body of a jaguar after death? (Kohn 2002, 175), Along with the actual consumption of normally prohibited animals, there are numerous other situal practices which aim to acquire a supplement of predatory potency. As part of the initiation of young men, the sisteenth-century Tupinamba Jalled jaguars in the plaza as a substitute for human captives. ‘The animals were ritually killed but not devoured, in contrast to the enemy (Viveiros de Castro 1992, 248), Nowadays, upon killing «jaguar, the Parakana dance with its corpse in order to dream about it and transform themselves into it and subse- quently leave to huntin the forest (Fausto 2001, 878-79). Before departing on a war expedition, the Yanomami conduct a ritual which aims to ineorporate the vital images of certain animals, particularly the vulture, who help the killer to devour the victim during posthomicide seclusion (Albert 1985, 363). In all these ‘examples, the aim is to produce transformations in certain persons so that they can interaet with nonkin and familiarize them, These practices seek to constitute persons as potential terms in a future relation of familiarizing predation ‘To these practices in which animals are taken not as food but as the source of capacities we can add the consumption of narcotics and hallucinogens. I have already explored the connections between tobacco and the jaguar in South America (Fausto 2004, 165-69). Avahuasce (Banisteriopsis capi) is similarly associated with large predators. According to Harner (1973, 160), snakes (particularly the anaconda) and jaguars are the animals most commonly cited by Amerindians when explaining the effects of the drink. The Mavwé establish a direct, link between the beverage and felines: as a shaman notes, “the raster of /kaapif is a spotted jaguar... . When we cultivate it in bloody water ie, wter used for cleaning game], it becomes very wild” (quoted by Giraldo Figueiroa 1997, 276), The association between hematophagy and psychotropies is also found among the Mirafia: coca is kept in a small bag called “the devouring sprit bag,” the sprit in question beingFausto Feasting on People an eater of raw meat and blood (Karadimas 1997, 376, 576) In Northwest Amazonia, coca and ayabuasca are conceived as parts of the bodies of ancestors whe are themselves pred- ators (Stephan Hugh-Jones, personal communication). Lastly we have an example which makes the correlation between this modality of consumption and predatory warfare explicit. The Mirafa practiced ex0-cannibalism and fashioned necklaces from the teeth of their victims. The removal of the teeth was the final stage in the process of consanguinizing the ‘enemy that began with the homicidal act itself By wearing the necklace, the killer mobilized the predatory potential (guia) of bis victim, which enabled him to use these powers against the deceased's ex-consanguines. The same practice applies to the jaguar, today as in the past. Upon killing the animal, the hunter removes its canine teeth and hands them over to @ shaman, He also cuts off the tail (or removes the liver), which he will eat “lightly roasted” to curb his fear of ‘meeting the jaguar’s spirit. The shaman then summons the spirit, who speaks through his mouth and converses with the hunter, The teeth will be the neve resting place forthe jaguar’s ‘giist, and whenever the hunter needs its help he will don the necklace and summon the spirit of the jaguar (Karadimas 1997, 395)” ‘The Mitana practice offers a good example of what 1 have termed familiarizing predation: the conversion of relations of predation into familiarization, modeled as the passage from affinity to consanguinity. Familiarizing predation character- izes the taming of both the human victim in warfare and the animal victim in shamanism, In the latter case, however, the connection between hunting and familiarization is not im- mediate, except when the animal is devoured (literally or symbolically) in its condition as a person described above, However, in these cases the animal prey is equivalent to a 19, Here we have examples of plans consamed a ifthey were predator animals. This snot, however, the case of elvare snd some wild fits As Rival (2005, 15) notes, the predatory relational mode sat the unique ‘mode of inerspecies feeding in Amazonia. Generally, horticulture rep. evens safer socialtytwened toward the inside, in opposition to pred- tory scialty turned towaed the ouside (Fausto 2001, 514-15). From cultivars, however, people aso make bes, whose fermentation may be conceived os « proces of subjectifcation and drinking as a mode of predatory sltertion (se Lim 1995), 29, On such rales, se also Chav (1985) and Crocker (1979). In the late, Boro, cast the man who avenged the deth of « person ofthe ‘opposite moiety through the killing of eamnivore was required to make ‘necklace fom the anima’ teth or claws. Thi necklace wa given tthe decease’ relatives and as considered preiont relic. However, when the death was caused bya human enemy the avenger “had to kil one of the enemy instead ofa cuuivore, and the enemy's jawbone wis given as ‘neclice” (1979, 139). For the Ge-speaking, Ribas, jaguars ste the incaration of dead people, and ther canes mustbeestracted and pierced in onde to eatingush ter predatory capacity. The plecng ceremony is prohibited to children, women, and men with cet born children. Por ridge is made fr the men patipating, but the hunter cannot dik i ‘Once the piecing is completed, the hunter gives the agus eth toa man, from the opposite meiey, whe wl ute ther to fabricate « nicknce and wear it Although they are reported to have practiced canal, the kbs do not eat the jaghn’s meat (Atha 2006, 437-40), 307 human victim, and bunting is no different from homicide during warfare. In daily activities, in contrast, hunting mast be kept distinct from warfare, and even the consumption of & nonprohibited animal must, in certain cases and at certain times, be surrounded by ritual precautions 9 as to transform the animal into safe food. The Hunting of Peccaries ete we come tothe reason that hunting can be warfare only from the animals’ perspective. [there isno ontological barrier between human and nonhuman, humans must make the ef fort to distinguish the consumption of the animal as food from its consumption as a person. ‘To confuse hunting with ‘warfare i a5 Lima (1999, 124) says of the Juruna, to affirm the peccaries’ point of views “A fight takes place—a struggle between one’s hunt and the other’s war. The hunter's mis- fortune is the slipping of hunting into warfare.” The Juruna verbal interdiction therefore implies not the affirmation of the hunter's perspective but its production as a human per spective. In this sense, the interdiction is already pat of the esubjecttication of the future meal and the transformation of a person into food. The presupposition that peccaries are hhumans is stil there, but it is denied by an interdiction, and this establishes an asymmetry between the prey’s position and that of the predator. The intention to eat meat and not to rake war must be affirmed to avoid counterpredation. This, distinction can be expressed by 2 minimal diference such as is found among the Kashinawé, who used the same club to all peccaries and enemies but never the same side ofthe club (Kensinger 1975, cited in Erikson 1986, 205). According to Erikson, even if predators are occasionally enemies, animal game “should not be treated as an enemy” (1986, 94). For this to hold, differences need to be produced, ‘Thus the Sharanava killed jaguars with war spears and edible game with bow and arrow (Siskind 1973, 174). The use of different cynegetic techniques as a way of producing a dis- tinction between warfare and hunting is recurrent in Ama- Zonta; however, it does not always subdivide the fauna along the same lines. Predation of jaguars is almost universally equated with the killing of enemies, but the hunting of other large terrestrial mammals may also be compared to warfare. Here, the prototypical species tends to be the white-lipped peccary, which offers a model forthe generichuman condition itself they are not purely predators but mortals who are preyed upon and defend themselves bravely, live in groups, feat manioc, and possess a chief. Like humans, they are gre- sarious (signaling their capacity to produce kinship), socially organized in herds (signaling their recognition of asymmetric relations other than devouring), and cosmologically ambiv- alent, positioned halfway between prey and predator. The jaguar, in contrast, is characterized by solitariness and an almost unlimited predatory capacity, a capacity that is un- equally distributed among humans (being typical of warriors, shamans, and hunters}, and indicates the surpassing of the508 human condition (either positively through immortality or negatively through antisociability) (see Pollock 1993, 29; Ca- Tavia Saez 2001), ‘The salience of peccavies as a metaphor for the human condition makes the honting of this animal distinct from other hunting, and not only for technical reasons. It is not by chance that many Amazonian peoples associate the hunt {or white-lipped peccaries with warfare, setting it apart from the hunting of other animals. Indigenous peoples that hunt with blowguns, for example, tend to oppose this technique, aimed at arboreal species, to those based on the bow or the spear, used for kiling terrestrial mammals in general and. peccaries in particular. The use of the blowgun causes the vietim to shed litte blood (since the prey is killed by poison rather than the wound) and implies greater distance between hunter and prey, whereas the use of weapons of perforation causes intense bloodshed and involves a les distant relation- ship between Killer and victim. We thus have situations in which, differently from those described by Lima among the Juruna, the hunting of peccaries seems to be positively marked. as preying on enemies. How should we interpret this fact within the framework I have been delineating? ‘The peceary is the least prohibited mammal in all of Ama zonia, its exclusion from indigenous diets being rare, but it is also the game which tends to require the greatest effort at desubjectfcation either through the action of shemans or through ritualized commensality. The tapit may occupy a similarly prominent position (as appears to be the casein the Northwest Amazon and among the Mirafa), but it is not gregarious, does not involve the same collective efforts at hunting, and does not result in the same quantity of food. ‘This is why peccary mest, more than any other is subject to the moral imperative of ample sharing, whose nonfulfllment can lead to illness (Conlin 20014, 163). Not to share is to bochave like a lone predator; selfishness with food betrays a cannibal propensity, something that the Guarani make explicit by comparing stingy behavior to thet of jaguars (H. Clastres 1975, 113-34). Commensality and the shamanistc treatment ‘of food mark 2 distance from cannibalism: even though they are enemies, we do mot eat them as enemies: what we want is not theic subject part but their object part. The ambivalence of peccaries is also expressed in the rit- alized manner in which they may be consumed, often com- bining the two modalities of consumption (ontological and alimentary). The Huaorani of Ecuador distinguish the hunt- ing of arboreal animals with blowguns from the hunting of ppeccaries with war spears. When peccaries are Killed, this dis- tinction sesults in an orgiastic party. Upon returning to camp, the hunters place the hands of children on the palpitating and bloody skin of peccaries for them to absorb the animals’ strength and energy. Peccary hunting, Rival (1996, 156) says, “is special itis a collective slaughter followed by a feast Peccary meat, the meat of an omnivorous animal with an uncontrolled appetite, is considered highly intoxicating and Curent Anthropology Volume 48, Nomber 4, August 2007 ccan only be consumed infrequenty, in a kind of orgy, by the Juaomoni group in whose territory the herd was hunted.” ‘This ambivalence in the consumption of wild pigs, whieh seems on the verge of shifting into cannibalism, forces us to ask one final question: what, then, of anthtopophagy? Is an thropophagy necessarily a cannibal practice, or can humans be eaten as if they were merely food? Anthropophagic Commensality ‘Warfare anthropophagy has been observed among many Low: land South American peoples. It was practiced by Tupian groups such as the Tupinambé, the Guarani (Forsyth 1983, 1985) and the Chiriguano (Combés and Saignes 1999) in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and by the Shipaya (Ni- ‘muendajéi 1949) and the Juruna (Lime 1987) in the nine teenth century. [twas also reported to be practiced by Island and Continental Caribs in the colonial period (Whitehead 1984), Putumayo and Caqueté Rivers peoples such as the Mirafa and the Bora (Karadimas 1997, 715-17; 2001, 87), the Rikbaktsa of the Xingu-Tapajés interfluvial zone (Athile 2006, 107-8), the Arawakan-speaking Kurripaco ofthe Upper Rio Negro basin Gournet 1995, 191-97), and Chapakuran- speaking peoples such as the Wari” (Vileca 1982; see also Métraux 1949). One of the key elements of this anthropoph: agy was the disjunction of killers from eaters. Those who killed did not consume the meat of their victims; on the contrary, they had to abstain from it. This strict prohibition contrasts with the broad range of people who were allowed to eat an ‘enemy. According to the chroniclers who described the Tu pinamba anthropophagic ritual, men, women, children, and ‘even babies participated. Similatly, among the Wari’ of Ron- dénia, “any person, except the killers, could eat wijart [en= ‘emy] flesh, including women and children” (Vilaga 1992, 102), ‘Tupinambé warfare anthropophagy was expressed in the language of food desire and revenge. Human meat was con- sumed because it was sweet and appetizing and because ev- cexyone wanted to—or was expected to—take revenge on the cnemy. Eating produced an alliance among those who ate together and separated those who were, potentially, food for cone another. At the same time it produced the eaters as pred- ators and the food as prey. Hence the famous jest made by Cunhambebe, who, between bites of the roasted leg of an enemy, replied to Hans Staden—who had reproved him for cating his fellow humans—by remarking that he was a jaguar Yet what the Tupinambs chief ate was not the predator part ‘of the enemy, for this was devoured by the killer in seclusion, ‘The portion of the enemy left for him was its game part. In other words, the Tupinambé consumed humans as if they were food, The repast was an eating with and like someone in which the subjectivity of the object devoured was absent. According tothe definition 1 hove proposed, Tupinambi an- thropophagy was not cannibalism. What was eaten was a hhuman body reduced to an object, through which the eatersFausto Feasting on People identified with each other and produced a common condition (even if this envisaged common condition was not that of reek humans but that of full predators). Among the Arawakan Kurripaco, as described by Journet (1995, 191-97), a war party would butcher the body of slain enemy and take away as many body parts as possible, with the exception of the head and the guts. They might stop to eat it on the way home, but only in small quantities, since hhuman meat was held to be strong and dangerous. Once back in the village, all men and women took part in the meal. The flesh was roasted and distributed like any other animal's eat. Journet notes that in Kucripaco narratives the flesh of enemies is called “food” or “game” (p. 192). Meanwhile the killer had to make a flute from the enemy's femur, which was said to contain the victim’s breath. This became an inalienable pos- session and had to be buried with the killer upon his death, ‘Thus the killer, through the act of killing, consumed some- thing different from meat, bringing about a process of trans- formation publicly signaled by seclusion. But what was this “other thing’? In the literature on indigenous warfare in Ama- zonia, we find various terms for designating what is acquired upon killing an enemy, from commonplace terms such a8 “strength” and “courage” to categories derived from philos- cophy and psychology such as “subjectivity.” “activity,” and “intentionality” to metaphysical concepts such as “spit,” “breath,” and “Soul” These terms translate native categories ‘which possess in common the idea that this acquired “some- thing” corresponds to a capacity held by an other (human or nonhuman) which, on being captured through predation, be- comes an integral part ofthe predator as supplement. This supplement can be conceived 2s an alien self that merges with the killer, establishing an asymmetrical relationship with the Iatter (as in the Araweté case, for example), or as a capacity ‘which, although not hypostasizedin the form ofa self implies the future possibility of establishing asymmetrical relations with alien subjects (as in the Parakand case) (Viveiros de Castro 19961; Fausto 19990, 2004). T suggest that, in both cases, this captured supplement cor- responds to the predator part of the enemy, its jaguar part, ‘which is detachable and can be transferred from one subject to another. For the Parakana, homicide does not lead to the appropriation of a sprit: the killer is simply contaminated byy the odor of blood and by the “magic-fat” (kawahiwa) of the 21, The ritual feat aso implied transformative processes and may boave been marked by the characteristic ambivalence of the eating of “dangerous fod.” However the sealzation ofthe ontaogcal predation cecutted during other moments within the ritual cycle, Tupinambs ‘women weee abe to benef rom the killing by being renamed for aking part in vente which preceded the exeetion, such a the symbolic r= capture of che capive (Fausto 19994, 270-71). Among the Nivakle, ‘women danced with the bloody selp-tophy so thot "something of the soul-spirit of the victim would pass on to them (Sterpin 1995, 42). This amplification of the effets of ontological predation was 2 hallmark of “Amazonian indigenous warfare; the members ofthe war party could all be considered “kilers” and enter into seclusion sf even single death cccurted on the battlefield (ee Fausto 19996, 272-75; 200, 330-32) 509 victim, which confers a predatory and creative capacity on him This capacity is associated with that of dreaming, through which the Parakana familiarize enemies and receive names and songs from them, These songs are themselves called “Jaguar” (jawara), and the dreamer is said to be a “master of the jaguars” (jawajara), Upon transfersing a song, the enemy gives up a part of himself to the dreamer—his jaguar part, soto speak. The jaguar partis that which enables «subject in a relationship with another subject, to determine the direction of familiarizing predation (Fausto 2008, 164-65). ‘The homicide allows the killer to capture his victim's jaguar part, What remains for the eaters, therefore, is another part, objectified in a body and particularly in its flesh. This we ean call the gate part, the person’s potential as food, However, not all beings possess these parts in equal measure, since the partition is indexed by the food chein. Jaguars occupy an extreme pole, since everything in them points to a predator part; although they possess flesh, they are seen as not having 2 game part and are therefore rarely consumed as food.” This ‘may explein why, although the Tupinambé performed e sim- tlacrum of the anthropophagic ritual with jaguars inthe place of human victims, they did not eat them. Human meat, in contrast, was said to be delicious, as peccary meat certainly is, Peccares, as we have seer, possess both a substantial food part and abundant activeness. The separability of these two components is expressed inthe distinction between the master of peccaties (or the chief of the herd) and his animals: the first represents the jaguar part, while the second represents an anonymous collectivity, denoting the passive aspect of pec- caries, Indeed, the Piro say thatthe master of peccaries isthe jaguar ofits species (Gow 2001, 68). 22. This occurs only shen an adult male i led Children ave no “magicia,” while women have litle. The king of wemen does not produce the eestive rage which spurs the kl 10 new klings but leads ‘only to hunger, causing him to be stingy with relatives, a Dehavor as- sociated with the jaguar and opposed to commensaity emongkin (Fausto 2001, 318). IFjaguars have more jaguar pats than, s9y, agouti, among, humans such dilfeence are constructed in tes of biography, age, and ageodet Genezally speaking, babies have no jaguar part, women beve more than children bat less than men, and swrciocs and shamans (male oF female) have more then ordinary people. Such diferences inlct es hatlogies! belief, mortuary and warfare practices, and conceptions of hunting (ee Taylor 200 Vilags 2005, 451-82; Passo 2001 408-8). They alka point o dhe fact tha the “Soul” is not exally 4 given, a8 Viveios de Castio (2001) postulates, since its also constructed along withthe petson’s biography. Asa general and indeterminate virtuality of existence, he “soul” isa given, bur its destiny i to become inextricably inked with what the person becomes through the embodying of knowiedge and capacities. 123. In Muinane, the nominal dassifer gai applied to all snimate beings, sever afized tothe terms "Jaguar (wks) or “che (h?6?), if these were nonmasked cases ofthe cas “enimare being," prototypes ofthe quality “enimaton” (Vengoschea 2001 24, Asa defle condition, every species potentially as its ovm jagust part, sometimes hypostasiaed a the species master The agua howeves ‘uch ike the beat inthe Subartc, sa “chie unto hime” (to pa phrase Sinner {1911 95)), bavng no master or atleast none other than § powerfl human shaman, This des can also be expressed in ingisticsto The notion of a jaguar part applies equally well to sha- rmanism, which is often associated withthe establishment of 4 special relationship with familirized predators, The Ma- anainde Nambikwara, for instance, render this idea ofa de- tachable and transferable jaguar part highly tangible, since their shamans derive their curative and offensive powers from the litle feline that they hold between their tecth and cen release at wil (Miller 2007). For the Kanamati, shamans also have Jaguars, which they keep either in their bodies or in a container wiere they feed them with tobacco powdes, Upon 4 shaman’s death, one of his souls is liberated in the form of 4 Jaguar, which can subsequently be familiarized by another living shaman (Costa 2007) 1 sum, it can be stated that in war anthropophagy the distinction between killers and eaters corresponds to the dif ference between eating someone and eating with and like someone; therefore the act of eating a human was primarily a commensal pratice—an-other-bory was eaten so as to pro: duce a body of relatives. We still need to determine, however, if this analysis applies to funerary anthropophagy. Rating the Dead Funerary anthropophagy refers to the eating of the deceased’s flesh or bones or both. Osteophagy (the consumption of cal- cinated bones) was more common in the South American Lowlands than the consumption of the fesh. The latter was practiced in Western Amazonia by Panoan-speaking peoples, by the Chapakuran peoples of Rondénia and Bolivia, and, to the south, by the Aché-Guayaki. The former were observed ina large arc covering the north of Brazil, the Upper Orinoco, and the Northwest and Upper Amazon (Chaumeil n.). Co- Jonial sources report the occurrence of flesh anthropophagy in areas such as the Tapajés Basin, Northeast Brazil, and the Maranbio (Métraux 1947, 24-25), but it is difficult to as- certain the veracity of these data As does warfare anthropophagy, funerary anthropophagy ofien involves a distinction between those who eat and those who do not, a distinction that follows kinship relations, though not always in the same way. There seems to be a difference, for example, between the consumption of flesh and the consumption of bones. While in the frst case close Kin do not eat (while affines or distant kin do eet), in the second the kin of the deceased tend to eat and conteol who can eat with them, Nonetheless, the distinction is more com- plex, for some peoples consumed both flesh and bones and in some cases established a variety of preseriptions and pro- hibitions. I have no intention of accounting for this variation terms. Most Carib language haven nominal modifier inl, which, ‘when sufxed to an animal ame indicate a spernatatal nd predatory ‘animal rather than an ordinary one. This is an important element in terms of understanding cei esthetics Armoag the Wyuna, fo instance, the basketry pattern “squire” i sald co represent not only a squitrel (omer bt also» bypersquitel (nerd), which is a supernatral aga (van Velthem 2003, 515), Gurrent Anthzopology Volume 48, Number 4, Angst 2007 here. In order to extend my analysis from warfare to funerary anthropophagy, I shall pose only one question: Can we say. that the meat that is eaten is the game part of the deceased! kin? ‘This is what both Vilaga (2000) and Conidlin (1993, 20014) report in relation to War? funerary anthropophagy. The de- ceased were consumed as game, an assimilation which was ritually expressed at two moments: first, when affines ate the compse butchered and roasted like game; and, secondly, during the ritual closure of mourning, when everyone, including close kin, ate game meat as ifit were a human corpse, Mourn- ing, which occurred in the interval between these two mo- ments, allowed the consanguines to defamiliarize the dead and thus share the viewpoint of affines, identifying the de- ceased kin with food (Vilaga 2000, 96), that is, with an object which provides the support for other relationships. For Conk- lin (1993, 1995), the work of mourning aimed to produce an anticipated image of the deceased as game, since the Wat” hold that their "ancestors" can return to the world of the living in the guise of white-lipped peccaries and offer them- selves as food to their former relatives. They cannot be com- ‘mensals with the living anymore, but they can still feed them, ‘Wari’ funerary anthropophagy is an example of eating with and like someone where the support for commensality was a human being Hence the requizement that every relative of the deceased be present, including those inhabiting other vil lages, even though this often meant that the corpse had be- ‘come putrefied by the time it was consumed, That there was ritual reduction of a deceased kinsperson to game does not mean that eating humans was a trivial or easy matter. In the Wari case, there was @ marked contrast between eating the ‘enemy's flesh and eating that of a relative. The former was to be devoured with voracity and demonstrations af anger, ‘whereas the latter was eaten in small parts, with the aid of litle wooden sticks and no demonstration of pleasure (Vilaga 1992, 102). Both were ritually treated as food but carefully distinguished in terms of eating manners and the expression of emotions. ‘Moreover, in the Wari’ funeral, the distinction between those who ate and those who abstained was not of the same order as that in war anthropophagy. The abstinence showa by kin expressed the defamilierization of a deceased Kinsper- son, while the killer's abstinence expressed the familiarization of a deceased enemy. The movements ate in opposite direc- tions but correspond to two aspects of the same process: defamiliarization for some always corresponds to familiari- zation for others. If the Wari? funeral severed Kinship rela tionships constructed throughout life, producing forgetting, italso permitted the familiarization of the deceased by another species of people, another body of kin, since the deceased was incorporated either into the species responsible for the death or into the subaquatic world of the dead (Vilaga 1992, 61; Conklin 2001.2, 166). ‘The assimilation of the corpse to food seems also to have characterized the funerary anthsopophagy of the Aché-Guay-Fausto Feasting on People aki (P. Clastres 1968). There was an emphasis on the ali- rentary character ofthe act (human flesh is tasty; those who do not eat it become thin) and on the notion that everyone, «except close kin, could or should eat the deceased. Although adults were eaten roasted, children were boiled in order for there to be “enough liquid for everyone” (p. 39). This exten- sive funerary commensalty was a decisive indicator of the networks of alliance among the different Guayaki bands friendly groups were to be invited (or receive a part of the corpse), lest they shoot arrows at “those who had forgotten them” (pp. 40-41). Another notion that we reencounter among the Guayaki is the idea of funerary anthropophagy’s producing or favoring the dissociation between body and soul, a notion which I suggest refers to the double operation of forgetting the dead and being forgotten by them (ie, defam- iliarization here and familiarization elsewhere). Funerary anthropophagy was most common among Pan- ‘oan peoples. According to Dole (1973, 302-8), 15 Panoan ‘groups are reported to have eaten their dead, 5 of them con- surning only the bones. The best-known example is undoubt ‘edly that of the Kashinawé. According to McCallum (1999, 66), anthropophagy was reserved for older men and women who were widely respected in the community—people who embodied multiple kinship relations, constituting central nodes in the relational network, To be eaten was the privilege of a few, but to eat was the daty of everyone. In this case, the meat was also eaten as though it were game, AS meet, the deceased could serve commensalty among relatives: “It is as if the kin effectively cartied out one final constitutive act of kinship. Instead of offering game or fish meat to the com- munity ... he offered his own body” (p. 456). Nonetheless, commensality among relatives exciuded the dead, who had to be forgotten, their names erased, their houses destroyed, and their paths wiped clean. The work of eating was likewise cone of forgetting. Is aim was to dissolve the body as the physical support of affective memories and relatedness through the process of cooking, which disengaged “the yuan {souls), still permeating the flesh, from the bodily remains that need to become transformed into mere meat” (Lagrou 2000, 167). IE the game part of the deceased served the production of kinship among the living, the “body soul” and the “eye soul” ‘were supposed to depart and establish an existence elsewhere, as “foreigners” (naa): the first soul with the animals in the forest, the second with the Inka (a celestial and cannibal god), where it acquired “a new body by clothing itself with the robe” of the deity (Lagrou 2000, 167). Here we find a set of correlations replicated at different scales: body is to soul as ‘meat is to bones a the body soul is to the eye soul. The first term is the prey part vis-i-vis the second term, the predator part, a5 though ech person contained multiple predatory Felations. Thus while feasting on the meat is associated with the liberation of the body soul, feasting on the bones is as sociated with the liberation of the eye soul, the bones being described by the Kashinawé man Pudicho Torres as “the bones si of the nawa (foreigner, ofthe powerful man, of the sky man, ‘of the jaguar, ofthe jadama (giant)” (McCallum 1999, 456), ‘This replication in the imegery of prey and predator, ob- jectfied in distinct parts of the dead person's body and at diferent scales, can be found in other ritual contexts where anthropophagy wes not practiced. The Jivaro, for example, used the head of an enemy, its jaguar part, as a subjective objects at the same time, thy fattened pigs, which were killed and served to their quests as substitute (imak) forthe enemy or, more exactly, for his game part.® The same argument can be applied to Amazonian eschatologis. Among the Piraba of the Madeira River, body and name have distinct fates. Each name received by a body in life is divided at death into two antagonistic components, Kaoaiboge and toipe, which repre sent the prey part and the predator part of the person (or a gregarious and social component in apposition to a warlike and cannibal one). The ‘pe live to prey on the kuoaiboge, ‘hich may sufer up to two deaths but on the third one are transformed into jeguars, In turn, the toipe become super- toipe when they are fist killed but if they are killed again become kaoaitoge, fulfilling their destiy as prey until they ‘become jaguars again (Gongalves 2001, 204-5). ‘The argument also helps us understand aspects of some Amazonian cosmogonies. Among the Fiatoa, for instance, the ‘origin of al earthly creation isa chimerical being called Ofor Da’a (Tapie/Anaconda), a composite ofthe largest game and ‘one of the main predators of South American topical forest. ‘Ofo/Da’a is responsible for the birth of the two demiurges, Wahari and Kuemoi, who inherit diferent powers contained in him. The mythic struggles between these two demiurges axe the origin ofthe current state of the world. Wahari ends up Killing Kueroi for his cannibalistic attacks on bis realm, the jungle, and is subsequently killed by his ov fail for his incestuous behavior. Both are reborn and now live on the earth, Kuemoi as anaconda and Wabari as tapir (Overing 1983-84, 337-40), ‘The complexity of each ethnographic example demands a rote careful analysis than I can offer here. My argument concerning anthropophagy should not be taken as an analysis cof anthropophagie rites per se. There is much moze tobe said about them, especially concerning the continuous inversion ofthe positions of predator and prey and the complex ways 25, Elawhere (Faso 19986, 947) 1 mistakenly treated these ps a captured peccaries According to Kasten (1988, 128), domestic pigsand chickens were introduced among the lvao by the Spaniards. Both had 4 central role in the sania ral eye (1988, 05-6; se aso Taylor 1994), but pigs were rarely employed as ordinary food (Harner 1978, 6). Uhave no data to affirm that captured pecaries wore used before the introduction of pgp There are, however, examples ofthe ritual cap ture and slaying of pecearies in Amazonia (among Tupi Monde speaking peoples of Rondénia (Dal Poz 1933, 186-90; Denny Moore, personal communication), a well a a strong association berween heechnters tnd peccie (among the Murvdurl [Murphy 1958, 53-591), The fet that pigs and not peceares sere ased in the tte ital does not contradict my arguments on pets and faralariing predation in Am: zona (Fausto 1998, 200; s€ also Deseo 1954),52 Jn which relations are put into action ina specif, ritual form. Rituals produce transformations in a complex st of relations, both internal and external to the person, Here Ihave focused mainly on commensal, since my aim has been to discuss the status of meat eating and personhood in Amazonia, lse- where Ihave dealt with other aspects of warfare and shamanic rites (Fausto 1999%; 2001, 419-68). “his sad, I believe that we can accept (and this is enough for my aims here) that in anthropophagy human flesh is consumed as food, that there isa disjunction between on- ‘ological predation and commensality, and that this disjunc- tion is founded on the possibilty of separating the human person into predator pars and prey parts, distinction which is often, though not exclusively, indexed by the predatory relation Reconfiguring Body-and-Soul Dualism Throughout this text, { have being progresivly led to re conceptualize body-and-soul dualism. I have started with a general question which concerns all “animistic ystems”: in ontologies in which both humans and animals are persons, how can the consumption of game be differentiated from cannibalism? This question has been posed before by other “Amazonianists (see Descola 1998; $, Hugh-Jones 1996) and by specialists on indigenous peoples of the boreal forest Brightman (1993) addreses it dtectly by acknowledging the instability ofthe ontological categories of animals and humans among the Cree: if they share a condition a8 persons, how are we to distinguish e hunter from a sorcerer ota cannibal, who eats humans because he sees them as animals? For Brightman, the model ofthe hunt asa gf from animals offers a suitable compromise for this insoluble parados, for it negates its warfare and cannibalistic character. But this = definition of the prey asa giver depends on the further dis- tinction between a zoomorphic body and an anthropomior phic soul: “The flesh and skin of animals are represented as distinct and iteratively detachable from the humanoid essence and identity: the body is likened to clothing that the animal discard... There is no cannibalism because the similitude of human and animal exists in relation to the soul” (Bright- man 1993, 205-6), What animals give up to humans—their bodies—is lke a piee of clothing which they surrender upon being shot (Tanner 1979, 137). Both the notion of regenet- ation and thet of clothing point 10 the separation of that ‘which humans appropriate from the potential for life which animals conserve despite being hunted and killed. The on- tological problem of cannibalism would thus be resolved through the separability of body and soul (the meat-food being distinguished from the animal subject) while the moze problem would be resolved by the emphasis on sharing and compassion between humans and animals. Brightman’s an- ser depends not only on postulating 2 distinguishabilty be tsveen zoomorphiic body and anthropomorphic soul but also on adopting the idea that cannibalism isthe consumption of Curzent Anthropology Volume 48, Number 4, August 2007 the same. ‘To the extent that the similarity between humans and enimals occurs at the level of the soul, eating the body of prey is not cannibalism. In this article T have moved away from this notion, seeking to redefine cannibalism as the consumption ofthe active part of the other. have sought to show that although Brightman’s formulation in terms of a body-soul dualism may be eco- nomical, it does not work very well in Amazonia, In saying this T am not asserting the nonexistence of distinctions be ‘tween more and less material, more and les representational, ‘more and less relational components of the human and the nonhuman person, Yet these distinctions are not organized by 2 global dualism, be it because there are multiple souls, because the body is not a discrete nit, because the soul has a body and certain parts of the body have more soul than others, or because the body does not contain a soul within it the presence of the soul being the manifestation of the absence of the body. In Amazonia, there seems to be a con- stitutive tension between the provisory unity of the person and its fragmentation into two different modes of plurality: the dual and the multiple (Strthern 1988, 274-80). The dual ray indeed emerge as a distinction between an interior es sence (“souk” “mind”) and an exterior envelope (“body,” skin”), which Ingold (2000¢, 23) sees as a fundamental di- ion in the animism of the cicumpolar North. Most of the time, however, duality is much more complex than this by Virtue ofits feacal structure and its scaling mechanism, More- over, such duality coexists with the idea of a continuous ac- cretion of potency throughout life, which is better conveyed by the notion of supplementation and is linked to each per- son’s biography. Amazonian eschatological beliefs present i teresting examples of multiple souls, sometimes reducible 9 a duality and sometimes tending to an ireducible multiplicity ‘The distinction between animal clothes and humanoid es- sence does not apply very well in Amazonia. On one hand, many of the agentive and subjective capacities that confer intentionality and potency on humans tend to be found moze in some animals than in others, particularly in predators (and, among them, in those possessing intricate designs, such as the jaguar and the anzconda). On the other hand, humans ‘possess a sort of blank skin which can be decorated, dressed, cr even changed by the appropriation of designs, patterns, feathers, and animal pets. These “skins” or “clothes” often represent the active part ofthe person, a supplement of beauty and agentive capacity. Ths is why, for example, the Barasana ‘burn the feathers and fur of animals they wish to desubjectify in order for them to serve as food and use them as ornaments ‘when they want to appropriate the “potentially dangerous power of their ‘weapons” (S. Hugh-Jones 1996, 141). The zoomorphic body is not a monolithic unit, a mechanical sub- strate inhabited by a humanoid essence, Each of its pars i, in a different measure, an edifice of “multiple souls.” In the face of these facts, I have moved away from the current view that animals and plants are also persons because they possess, as humans do, an anthropomorphic essence of-Fausto. Feasting on People ten called “spirit” or “soul” I have preferred to treat the person as an amalgamation of activity and passivity, as some- ‘ne who contsins to possible perspectives in a relation of predation. The move from potency to act, from predatory _ tension to predatory act, is whet produces the disjunction of these perspectives into detachable parts, parts which can then be transacted (Strathern 1988; 1999, 48-54). Thave algo drawn attention to the fact that this partition is not simple but complex, since itis replicated at different scales and is subject to inversions and condensations, An analysis of certain situa would undoubtediy shed light on this type of fractal com= plexity, which is congenial to some recent models of Ams zonian socalty (Viveiros de Castro 20015 Taylor 2000, 20015, Kelly Luciani 2001) In order to avoid a simple opposition between body and soul (or between animal appearance and human essence), T have proposed the distinction between consuming the other in its condition as subject and consuming it in its condition asobject. This distinction i dynamie and complex. Its premise is that all persons in the cosmos, in degres proper to their species and conditions, have a positive potential to occupy the agent position and a negative potential to occupy the patient position in a predatory elation. This double potency is internal to the person and constitutive of the person's spe cific condition: @ person is thus an amalgam of predator and prey. When predatory interaction is established between two persons thus constituted, « metarlation is created in which one of them occupies the agent postion and the other oc ‘upies the patient position. Yet the predatory act does not ‘eclipse the multiple and partible constitution of the person; ‘on the contrary, it makes this constitution manifest by means cof a fracture that can lead to two types of consumption: the consumption proper to warfare and eannibalisin (in which fone consumes the predator parts of the victim) and the con- sumption characteristic of cuisine (in which one consuemes the prey parts ofthe victim). ‘These modalities require supplementary labor, since both cases there isthe risk ofa reversal in positions. On one hand, by consuming the predator part of the prey, the killer runs the risk of becoming prey: this is why he needs to undergo seclusion through which the predator pert of the prey is turned into the predator part of the predator. On the other hhand, the predatory act doesnot immediately turn game into an inert object; one must continue to deconstruct the subject, progressively removing the activity it contains through aseries of shamanic and culinary operations. This process of objec: tification reduces prey tothe condition of food, which serves to produce both the body of kin and a body of kin—both their bodies and the sociality of kinship. In contrast tothe jaguar, a dread and lone predator, humans possess the means to distinguish daly alimentation from can nibatism. Hence the importance of culinary fie in the myths analyzed by Lévi-Strauss (1964) in The Raw and the Cooked. ‘These myths speak not ofa definitive rupture between nattre and culture but of two predatory codes, that of the jaguar 513 and that of humans, which make the first a master among, ‘masters and allow the second to produce kinship. Culinary fire makes it possible for carnivorous meals to be noneannibal, allowing kin to produce each other as kin. Ifall they ate were ‘animal agents they would end up either becoming one of them or being unable to recognize any form of relationship other than devouring, This is why some hunters do not eat their own prey or do not earry it or avoid certain patts, such as the head. They wish to remain human, providing meat for their wives, children, and affines. This is why generosity and ‘moderation are basic indicators of the acceptance of kinship while gluttony and selfishness are associated with sorcery, the jaguar; and solitude, ‘The ethical question in Amazonia thus seems to favor re- lations between kin over those between humans and animals This is not a matter of excluding cannibalism. There is no definitive rupture between the predatory code of the jaguar and that of humans. It is, instead, a matter of making can- nibalism moderate, mediated by specialists and practiced on ritual occasions. Were this otherwise, cannibal predation would become the measure of relations on the inside and there would be no production of kinship. We would all be jaguars—and this only some gods can be. Acknowledgments [A fits draft of this article was presented at the Beole des Hautes ftudes en Sciences Sociales in 2001, and a revised version appeared in Mana Estudos de Antropologia Socal in 2002. thank the Coordenadoria de Apoio 20 Ensino Superior (CAPES) of the Brazilian Ministry of Education for a post doctoral fellowship and the Laboratoire @’Anthropologie So dlale {Collage de France) for receiving me as a visiting ve seatcher. I gratefully acknowledge Philippe Descola for the invitations and for his comments. Iam also gratefl to Fréd- éric Laugrand and Jarich Oosten, who gave me the oppor tunity C0 present my core argument to specialists on indig- ‘enous peoples of North America and Siberia at the meeting “The ‘Nature of Spirits: Human and Non-human Beings in Aboriginal Cosmologies,” held in Québec, Canada, in 2004 For sharing their ideas and precious data, thank Aparecida Vilaga, Stephen Hugh-Jones, Jean-Pierre Goulard, Dinntsi Karadimas, Jean-Pierre Chaumeil,Isebelle Daillant, Marcia Damaso, Denny Moore, and Carolina de Aragjo, My thanks also go to the anonymous reviewers of CA, who sere generous enough to discuss my ideas critically giving me the oppor: tunity to improve the text. Marilyn Steathera read fist drat, and am grateful for her comments. Rane Willeslev and 26. Ge myts on the oxgin of culinary fire insist that the jaguars completely dispossessed of the fre that once belonged to i even the ‘embers whic fal elong the way daring the esape are cael recovered ‘or put out by those who have stolen the fre. The War? version of this myth (Viaga 1932, 237-41, in eur, makes eulnary fe into nary fire, meaning that hurnans come to be defined at eaters of roasted kin rather than ra kn,su Virginie Vaté helped me access the recent Siberian literature, ‘This text is part of an ongoing conversation among many people, and although the sharing of data and insights bas rade of us commensals of a sort, I claim, as usual, respon- sibility for any mistakes and for the cannibal incorporation of other people's ideas. The text was translated by Luiz Coste and revised by David Rodgers Comments Kaj Arhem Box 700, SE 40530 Goteborg, Sweden (ajahein@yahoo.e) 6m 07 Fausto’ article provides a useful synthesis of important as- pects of indigenous Amezonian animism. It can be read as an explication (or a reformulation?) of certain themes in Vi- veiros de Castro's (19982) landmark paper on Amerindian perspectivism (the “somatic” form of animism), a paper which, I belive, has still more to yield for students of an- imistic ontologies. Fausto writes in the tradition of Amazo- nian scholaeship that Viveires de Casteo (1996a) has called the “symbolic economy of alterity,” and [am in general agree ‘ment with both his facts and his argument. Moreover, Fausto’s model certainly resonates with my own understanding of Northwest Amazonian ethnography (see, ei Arhem 1998, 2002; Arhem et al. 2008). 1 only regret that Fausto did not develop his comparative discussion more full. The parellels and contrasts betveea the Americas and Asia are, as he notes, many and significant. The transformation of the “Sibero-Americen animistic tradition” into a Southeast Asian variety would seem to me to be of considerable theoretical and comparative interest. Thus, among indigenous Southeast Asian peoples such as the Katuie groups of Vietnam the animistic premise is universal. As in Northwest Amazonia, the “soul” is conceptualized as the a- pacity of subjects ta harm (“eat”) one another. Asin Subarctic America, hunting is coneemed with prey regeneration and the respectful deposition of hunting remains. Animal sacrifice appears to take the place of food shamanism. Food prohi- bitions and sharing of game are instrumental in constituting social identity. Ritual homicide was until recently prevalent, serving as a means of “familiarizing predation” very similar to the Amazonian case. Funerary rituals, however, seem to ‘work on premises opposite to those informing Amazonian practices, namely, to reconnect the dead with their living kins- men as benevoleat ancestors rather than transforming them into metaphorical affines/enemies (see Hung n.d.). Tn my opinion, the weakest, if only the least accessible, part of the paper is its treatment of the body-soul conundrum, Fausto demonstrates that in Amazonian ontology there is no clear-cut Cartesian body-soul dualism (a point made by a Current Anthropology Volume 48, Number 4, August 2007 number of Amazonianists). Instead he proposes thatthe per- son is best understood a¢ “an amalgamation of activity and passivity, someone who contains two possible perspectives in 4 relation of predation’—an idea he also formulates in terms of the *partbility” of persons (human and nonhuman) into 1 predator part and a prey part, where the predator part determines the direction of the predatory relationship. This formulation seems to take our understanding of Amazonian cosmologies no farther than Viveirs de Castro's view that bbody and soul are perspectival aspects of the person corte sponding not to substantves or ontological provinces but “to pronouns or phenomenological perspectives” (19984, 481). [As subject, the person is endowed with agency and inten- tionality —“soul"—manifested, among other things, asthe ca- pacity for predation; as objec, the person is reduced to “body” (prey or “food") ‘Among many indigenous groups of mainland Southeast Asia, game is compulsorily shared among vilagers. in addi- tion, the head of the animal—the seat of the enimal soul— must be communally consumed (in the form of a soup) by the men of the village in the context of an exclusively male ritual, thus afirming their shared identity as men of a par- ticular village (an identity which is complementary to kin and clan affiliation). What is the relationship, in Feusto’s Ama- zonian survey, between predation, commensaity, and gender? Finally, I have argued (Arhem 1996, 1998) that the pred ator-prey relationship in Northwest Amazonia is elevated to a fandamental and pervasive cosmological code structuring the cosmos and vertically integrating its principal protago- rists—spirits, humans, and animals—in a veritable “cosmic food-chaie.” It seems to me that this tophie model is in certain respects comparable to the model of “generalized ex change” that structures and integrates many Southeast Asian societies: both are key tropes of sacio-cosmic integration and reproduction, To what extents the trophic trope of Northwest ‘Amazonia applicable to other regions of Amazonia, and how does it relate to Fausto's model of predation? If predation in ‘Amazonia is what generalized exchange is in Southeast Asia, then could not the two notions account for significant sim- ilarites and differences between the animistic traditions of the two regions? imitri Keradimas Laboratoire Anthropologie Sociale, College de France, $2, rue du Cardinal Lemoine, 75005 Paris, France (dimitrikaradimas@college-de-francef).9 107 Fausto's article deals with a. common Amerindian topic in anthropology: food prescription/prohibition in conjunction With the construction of the body/person and selflother per~ ception. The range of food possiblities is here mainly re- stricted to meat Generally specking, the way of obtaining mest, whether of hhurman or animal origin, constructs common categories such