To be or not to be

"Moab"
"Denmark"
"Kuna Yala"
"Shaquille O'Neal"
Psalm 60:8
" Moab is my washpot; over Edom will I cast out my shoe: Philistia, triumph thou because of me."

 

A New Day

Creative Challenge Winner: Black History Month

Chess: "Factor" "Factorization" "Baptism" "Denmark" "Fruit Loops" "Sven Goran Eriksson" "Kuna Yala" "Cundinamarca" "Toucan Sam" "Shaquille O'neal"

News from the Library of Congress

February 11, 2009

Kuna Indians of Panama Subject of Symposium at the Library of Congress on Feb. 27

Known worldwide for their popular textiles, the colorful "molas" or clothing, the Kuna Indians live mainly in the San Blas Islands off the coast of Panama. Less well known is the rich history and oral tradition of this important Caribbean civilization.

The Library of Congress Hispanic Division, in cooperation with the Embassy of Sweden and the University of Maryland, convenes a symposium, "The Kuna and Anthropology: A Century of Engagement," on Friday, February 27, from noon to 2 p.m. in the Mary Pickford Theater, third floor of the James Madison Building, 101 Independence Avenue, S.E., Washington. D.C. The event is free and open to the public.

In 1931 Kuna Indian Rubén Pérez Kantule traveled to the Ethnographic Museum in Goteborg, Sweden, where he spent six months interpreting the Kuna collections and collaborating with anthropologist Erland Nordenskiold, who was a pioneer fieldworker in the modern tradition of social anthropology.

The fascinating Spanish-language diary kept by Kantule during his research is a sort of reverse ethnography, an Indian writing about the scientists in Sweden in their "museum village." Currently, the manuscript is being prepared for translation into English, as well as publication and digitization by a team of American and Swedish scholars.

Keynote speaker at the symposium is Kuna scholar James Howe, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who will discuss Kuna anthropology. Magnus Dahlbring, formerly with the World Cultures Museum in Goteborg, Sweden, will offer commentary. Tito Pérez Quintero, son of the late Kantule, participates in a panel discussion with Howe, Dahlbring, Janet Charnela of the University of Maryland and Edgardo Krebs of the Smithsonian Institution.

The Library of Congress, the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution, is the world’s preeminent reservoir of knowledge, providing unparalleled collections and integrated resources to Congress and the American people. Many of the Library’s rich resources and treasures may also be accessed through the Library’s Web site at www.loc.gov and via interactive exhibitions on a new, personalized Web site at myLOC.gov.

The Hispanic Division, established in 1939, is the Library’s center for the study of the cultures and societies of Latin America, the Caribbean, the Iberian Peninsula and other areas where Spanish and Portuguese influences have been significant. The collections comprise more than 12 million items about the Luso-Hispanic world, including several hundred scholarly books and articles relating to the Kuna Indians. For more information about the Hispanic division visitwww.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/.

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PR 09-026
02/11/09
ISSN 0731-3527

Eriksson:

An interesting addition: The Baron Erland Nordenskjold, of Goteburg University in Sweden, investigated and found that up to 80 commonly used Kuna words are either exactly or similar to ancient Norse. Some Kuna traditional historians make a link to the Vikings who may have visited the Kuna thousands of years ago.

Kuna (people)

Kuna or Cuna is the name of an indigenous people of Panama and Colombia. The spelling Kuna is currently preferred. In the Kuna language, the name is Dule or Tule, meaning "people," and the name of the language in Kuna is Dulegaya, meaning "people-talk."
The Kuna are often mistakenly identified as being related to the extinct Cundara people. They have some of the same traditions but have a totally different background.
The Kuna live in three politically autonomous comarcas or reservations in Panama, and in a few small villages in Colombia. There are also communities of Kuna people in Panama City, Colón, and other cities. The greatest number of Kuna people live on small islands in the comarca of Kuna Yala. The other two Kuna comarcas in Panama are Kuna de Madugandí and Kuna de Wargandí.
Kuna families are matrilinear and to some extent a matriarchy. After marriage, the bridegroom must live in his mother-in-law's house and work for his father-in-law.

Economy

The economy of Kuna Yala is based on agriculture and fishing, with a long tradition of international trade. Plantains, coconuts, and fish form the core of the Kuna diet, supplemented with imported foods, a few domestic animals, and wild game. Coconuts, called ogob in the Kuna language, and lobsters are the most important export products, and migrant labor and the sale of molas provide other sources of income. Most imported goods originate from Colombian ships and are sold in retail stores owned by Kuna people. Tourism is an important part of the economy in the Carti region, and abandoned goods from the drug trade provide occasional windfalls.
The Kuna are famous for their molas, a colorful textile art form made with the techniques of applique and reverse appliqué. Mola panels are used to make the blouses of the Kuna women's national dress, which is worn daily by many Kuna women. Mola means "clothing" in the Kuna language. The Kuna word for a mola blouse is Tulemola, (or "dulemola") "Kuna people's clothing."

History

The Kunas were living in what is now Colombia at the time of the Spanish invasion, and only later began to move westward towards what is now Kuna Yala. Centuries before the conquest, the Kunas arrived in South America as part of a Chibchan migration moving east from Central America. At the time of the Spanish invasion, they were living in the region of Uraba and near the borders of what are now Antioquia and Caldas. Alonso de Ojeda and Vasco Nunez de Balboa explored the coast of Colombia in 1500 and 1501. They spent the most time in the Gulf of Uraba, where they made contact with the Kunas.
In far Eastern Kuna Yala, the community of New Caledonia is near the site where Scottish explorers tried, unsuccessfully, to establish a colony in the "New World". The bankruptcy of the expedition was one of the causes of the loss of sovereignty over their own lands, to the British.
There is a wide consensus regarding the migrations of Kunas from Colombia and the Darien towards what is now Kuna Yala. These migrations were caused partly by wars with the Catio people, but some sources contend that they were mostly due by bad treatment by the Spanish invaders. The Kuna themselves attribute their migration to Kuna Yala to conflicts with the native peoples, and their migration to the islands to the excessive mosquito populations on the mainland.
During the first decades of the twentieth century, the Panamanian government attempted to suppress many of the traditional customs. This was bitterly resisted, culminating in a short-lived yet successful revolt in 1925, led by Iguaibilikinya Nele Kantule of Ustupu and a treaty in which the Panamanians agreed to give the Kuna some degree of cultural autonomy.

Albinism

he Kuna have a very high incidence rate of Albinism. In Kuna mythology, Albinos were given a special place.^[3] The Kuna Albinos are considered a special race of people, and have the specific duty of defending the Moon against a "dragon" which tries to eat it on occasion...the Eclipse. Only they are allowed outside on the night of an Eclipse and use specially made bows and arrows to shoot down the dragon. In the 1920s, an American adventurer explored the Kuna area looking for the albino indians. Richard Marsh also helped organize the Tule Revolution of 1925. He wrote about his adventures in a book.
An interesting addition: The Baron Erland Nordenskjold, of Goteburg University in Sweden, investigated and found that up to 80 commonly used Kuna words are either exactly or similar to ancient Norse. Some Kuna traditional historians make a link to the Vikings who may have visited the Kuna thousands of years ago.