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Home > Tipití > Vol. 8 > Iss. 1 (2010)

 

Abstract

This paper introduces the figure of “laterality” to differentiate two modes of conceiving relationships among the Waiwai of Northern Amazonia. One mode that works through direct unmediated relations, and another mode that works through particular non-direct mediated forms of relating. The aim of the paper is to describe the gap between these two forms of relatedness, while at the same time discuss the demands and expectations as well as promises and potentialities that accompany the deployment of these two modes. These issues are articulated by means of a sequence of conceptual images that go from the so-called -yesamarî or meanders in Waiwai life to the irreducible diversity of detours, the potential afterlife through translation, and the transformative effect of comparisons.

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