Books: Tribal Peoples for Tomorrow’s World

I was always somewhat miffed by Survival International’s use of the term tribal peoples, thinking it offensive and believing that the word indigenous should be used instead.

But in this book, an overview of the historical backdrop and contemporary situation of the world’s 370 million indigenous people, Stephen Corry is at pains to explain the term.

Corry has been the director of Survival International since 1984. He says indigenous means those on the land before newcomers – the descendants of those who were there before others who now constitute the mainstream society. Indigenous people must self-define.

Tribal peoples, on the other hand, means those who have followed ways of life that are clearly different from the dominant society for many generations and who are largely self-sufficient.

Corry emphasises that this is the best way he can explain it (there are other definitions available). Of course they are not absolutes and there are overlaps all over the place. But it is fair to say that the majority of tribal peoples are indigenous.

The book is a fantastic beginner’s guide to what Corry calls “a major humanitarian issue”. To pack about 200,000 years of history into a 300-page book is a great achievement.

The reader is taken through the various forms of living off the land – hunter-gathering, farming, agriculture and so on. And here, Corry debunks myth after myth, as he does throughout the guide.

The hierarchy placed by westerners on food collection, with agriculturalists above hunters is unhelpful. Not only must the hunter be precise, maintain knowledge of the terrain as well as the hunted, it is rare for a community to practise one method exclusively.

Continent by continent we look into the lives of some of the best and lesser-known indigenous peoples. The First People, which Corry calls the Bushmen, also known as Khoisan, are kin to the Batwa of Congo (and more commonly cited as the First) and connecting countries including Uganda.

The situation for most follows a pattern of being thrown off their land by governments that want to turn forests into national parks, or a mining company that bulldozes through land, deliberately killing or making empty promises.

Museums with objects from indigenous peoples might find this book useful as a reminder of the many difficult aspects that surround these issues. Corry briefly covers the historical trajectory that led to more museums addressing the current plight of the cultures they present in exhibitions.

He points to the refusal of the British Museum in 1985 to reveal the contemporary situation of Amazon Indians in its Hidden Peoples of the Amazon exhibition. Corry balances this with the bonding between museum and indigenous groups that has occurred in some cases.

Corry says the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is concerned with the individual rather than community. For those living separately from the state, it has no relevance. And what’s more, the UDHR includes elementary education as compulsory, which for Corry recalls governments and missionaries using schooling as a weapon to denigrate tribal peoples’ values.

One problem with the book is the inevitable attempt at justification of the contemporary relevance of tribal peoples. Unfortunately, the tendency to compare how Europe does things is a mechanism Corry uses often to show the correlations or conversely Europe’s more barbaric or unsocial practices.

It works well to get the points across, and perhaps it is necessary to speak to the readership. But one of the missions of the book is to show that the cultures of indigenous peoples are acceptable and respected and so it shouldn’t matter whether or not they compare positively or negatively with a western way.

But it is also a reason why books such as this are needed, as are organisations such as Survival International.

Corry is right to say: “The more indigenous and tribal peoples are simply properly understood, the less they will be mistreated, and the more they will be respected as both our very close relatives and a vitally important sector of our human family.”

The book closes with a strong case for what tribal peoples can offer the world, particularly in this time of climate and conservation crises. How living closer to and more in-tune with the land might save the Earth and our species.

But also, and perhaps more importantly, how that tribal community spirit that has been shown by studies to reduce crime and nurture happiness can teach the west something about a sense of family, of oneness, that we seem to have lost.

Felicity Heywood is a cultural researcher and writer. Her latest project focuses on the Batwa of Uganda/Rwanda

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