Los cantos de Kanaima

Abstract

Firstly, the focus is on the classification of the entity Kanaima in the multiverse of the indigenous group of Pemón (Venezuela / Brazil). Secondly, the historical and current recordings of Kanaima songs are presented, whereby the functions of these songs are examined with regard to the body/soul administration and the associated (re)-transformation processes. Finally, the peculiarity of this anti-human entity in the Guianas is discussed in comparison to the animistic ontologies of the Amazon.

Resocializing recordings: Collaborative archiving and curating of sound as an agent of knowledge transfer

“…First, there are sound entities that can socialize with anyone; that is, all listeners may hear, and any knowledgeable person may perform, for example, the dance‐songs parishara , tukuik , and areruya , or songs for yucca rubbing. Second, and in stark contrast, there are also recordings from the Koch‐Grünberg corpus that prove ethically problematic: these were—and in certain cases still are—used for interaction in the field of shamanism and especially dark shamanism (Lewy, 2018a). Some of these songs were unknowingly released by the Berlin Phonogramm‐Archiv on a CD (Koch and Ziegler, 2006).…”

“…The curators and ethnomusicologists who chose and commented on the tracks were ignorant of their deeper meaning because they did not consult with Indigenous People. The experience and results of relistening to these recordings in the field are discussed in detail elsewhere (Lewy, 2017; for the ontological difference and emotional experience with Indigenous specialists in the field, see Lewy 2018d).…”

“…He found that new recordings necessarily had to be created to understand and contextualize historical recordings. Lewy has reported extensively on the motivation and joint discussion (listening sessions) of Theodor Koch-Grünberg's recordings elsewhere (Lewy, 2018d(Lewy, , 2015(Lewy, , 2017(Lewy, , 2021, so here we summarize some information that is relevant for the remainder of the argument.…”

“…Thus, ethnographic facts, and consequently any ethnological resonance that emerges from them, are constituted by the researcher in interaction with the researched. Usually, such unmentioned or unnoticed fact-constructions are (unconsciously or openly) based on other, mostly written, treatises on other groups being researched on (compare Lewy, 2015Lewy, , 2019. Beginning with the "crisis of representation," researchers' representations, which are mostly written, and their resulting fields of resonance have often been criticized, and rightly so.…”

“…For example, a deep understanding of sacred knowledge is necessary, but so too is caution when publishing it. For sensitive data in the form of so‐called kanaima songs and their potentially lethal entities, which may also raise the need for ethical protocols for children of an Indigenous group, see Lewy (2018a).…”