OF WOMEN, MEN AND MANIOC

PETER RlVilRE

The starting point for the problem con fronted in this

paper was 1964,1 when J read Irving Goldman's monograp h The Cuoco (1963). Beyond its general excellence
hne of the things in it that struck me was what seemed
an inordinate amount of time de voted by Cubeo women
to th e processing of man ioc, certainly in comparison
with the Trio from whom I had recently returned. I
came to the conclus.ion thst th e reason for th is was a
market among Colombian and Brazilian nationals for
ma?joc- products, in part icular farjnha, f rom the sale of
whIch the women could earn cash. However, from the
'ate 1970s onwards a large num ber of publications
relating to the Northwest Amazon Indians have appeared
and most of them confirm that Tukanoan women do
spe.nd a lot of time in the preparation of manioc products. Furthermore these recent ethnogra phies make it
clear that this activity cannot be related to the existence of an external market. Indeed, Christine HughJones puts her fin!>er on the problem when she notes
that 'Vaupes Indians differ from many ot her Amazonian
groups in carrying out the entire ftarvesting and separatin g process in a single day, and in making fresh
cassava bread whenever possible" (1979: 179). Goldman,
writing of Amazonia in general, has commented tha t
"Manioc cultivation (and I assume he also means processing) is almost - everywhere v.'omen ~s work. Thus it sets a
common pattern of sexual d ivision of labor as well as
basic technology' (1963:3). However, within this common
pattern there are variations, as there are in the time
d~voted 10 t he processing of manioc. This pa per contams an attempt to explain such ve;ria;ion. While there
may be mOre than one explanation, and reference is
~<:~;~~"'~""'~1\""'"

_ _;t(,_,

N .A "-': il)'N /\.l

AN'''l'f-;:'~>''''OLOGiA

1St. 11:) T1! CA

Iit~."

3,33 f

178

made to more than one in thi$ paper, the .rgume'tit b'et,

is th~t the variation is related to the degree
whict). 3 -_ community exercises over its women .
this in turn is re.1ated to aspects of social
tion' Before ' embarki ng on Ihis argume nt it
hel;ful to review some of the basic features of manioc.

Ji
Across most of the vast region of tropical forest dr"lfl'
ed by the rive rs Amazo n and Orinoco, the
of the native population is manioc. The
techni qu e most commonly associated with this.
slash-and-burn, and garden plots ra rely remaHl
cultivation more than five years. No-w here in -na-tiv.e
South Arne-rica is manioc grown alone, and it invat-i ab)y
shares Ihe garden with a wide range of supplementary
crops. Bee-a use of the 16w nutritio nal Qual!ty of n;anj~c)
which is high in carbohydrates but low 10 protem, Its
cuitivation is everywhere combined with h untin g, fishi~g
and gathering by wh ich activities the protei n and vitamins absent from the staple are provided. There
huge literature (for surveys of it see . Roosevelt
and Hames and Vickers 1983) on the lOfluence of
scarcity
good soil, adequate game suppl y and
ecological factors on the formation of Amazon!an .
ties but this paper is only indirectly a contnbutlon
it ..
is assumed that the manioc root is everywhere
plentiful supply and that the social and cultural
ties concerned wit h it are not a response to any
cit)' of the root itself'
Botanists now seem generally agreed that there are
not two -d omesticated spe.cies of manioc, bitter and
sweet, but one species with a wide range of varjeties~
What diffe rentiates the varieties is the content of
cyanogenic glucoside; the bitter varieties have a h igh
content, the sweet varieties a Jow con tent. The cyano-genic glucoside produces prussic acid as a resul; of
oxidation when exposed to the air. In practical
this means that bitler manioc has to be
order to remove the poison before tbe root

or

it

179

edible. However. this disadvantage of bitter manioc is

offset by the fact that the more poisonous varieties
have a hi gher starch content and can be used to produce a much wider range of foodstuffs than can the
sweet varieties. It is the differen t procedures used in
the prepara tion of bitter ma nioc, including th e removal
of the poison, that accounts for variation in the time
taken b)" various Indian gro,ups.
Anna Roosevelt is almost certainly righ t wh en she
writ es that "The elaborate mani oc-processing techniques
are widely though t to have been de veloped for the
purposes of det oxifying manioc roots' (1980:129). But, as
she co nt inues, in practi ce pr ussic acid is hig hly volatile
and can be driven off by simple and ordinary culinary
methods. Accordingly some writers have sought other
expl3na ti ons for the elaborate techn iqu es employed.
These include lhe fac t that under certain conditions not
all the cyanogenic glucoside gets converted in to prussic
acid, so th at the Amerindian procedures act not simply
to remove the acid~ v/hicn is anyhow rel atively easy to
do, bu t 10 help th e conversion of the glucoside. If not
converted and removed traces of glucoside will transform in to pr uss ic add in the stomach. The qua ntities
are too smal1 to do any direct harm? but there are
implications for nutritional levels since detoxification in
the stomach requ ires amino acids, which thus reduces
the supply for norm. I human requirements. This may
have im plicat ions for the piotein determinis t argume,nt~
but it is diffkult to argue that the ~~merindians themselves are aware of this, t hat this is the reason the y
process manjoc the way they do. or that it accounts for
the varying degrees of elaboration of this process from
one gro up to another.
Roosevelt herself seems to favor the suggestion that
the elaborate processing te ch niques operate to re move
substa nces th at "adversely affect the keeping properties
of harvested manioc roots or hinder the manufacture of
easily transported bread and flour' (idem). She attempts
to correlate the degree of elaboration w ith climate
differences arguing that the more elaborate methods are
180

f ound in the eastern a nd middle Amazon whe.re there is

a marked d ry season, whereas the simpler methods OCCu r
towards th e Andean fo othills, where rain falls all the
year round. Tn the latter region , she claims, -planting
can take place at any time of year, whereas in the
former it is restricted to the rainy season. The more
elaborate mt'thods are associated with the need to store
in order to cover pe riods of shortage. Howev er, her
argument does not stand up for several reasons. First~
white it is true that the init ial planting of a f ield is
normally restricted to one time of the year, the sf'cond
planting of a field takes place all the year round as the
first crop is ha rvested. Sec ond ~ the fact that the man ioc
root can remain in the ground for two years or more
with little de teriora tion removes any nec.essity for
storae. This does not mean that lhere are no groups in
the ~astern and middl'e Amazon that harvest and store
manioc flour; th ere are, and the best documented are
the Kuikuru of the Upper Xingu. From Carneiro's (1983)
very detailed accoun t of Kuikuru ma n ioc cultivation and
processing it is clear that their procedures are no more
elaborate than those of other eastern and middle Amazonian groups who do not practice storage. Third, the
correlation that Roose-yell makes between wetter western areas and simple r techniq ues is no t supported by
the evidence. She refers to a single example, the ]ivaro,
cjting three sourCeS: Har ner ~ who ma kes it quite clear
that he is referring to sweet, not bitter manioc
(197 3:
47); Meggers (1971, relying on Karsten 1935) who states
une qui vocally th at sweet man ioc is the Jivaro sta pJ~;
and finally a personal communication from Ross which 1S
also likely to refer to th e sweet va riety. In other wordS
the correJation is based on a false comparison since
sweet manioc does not require the same preparation as
the bitter.
Perhaps a more relia ble correlation than that between
ela boration of procedures and climate is that between
degree of co mplexity of the processing. techniqu~ and
the extent to which manioc plays a major pa rt In the
diet. There is considera ble variation in the procedures
9

181

used within different parts of the tropical forest. Dole

(1 960) identifies seven different methods of squeezing
manioc, ranging from the use of the bare hands to the
tipili. the intricately wo ven sleeve press. Colchester and
Lister. in a report on the Ventauri region of Venezuela,
describe the Sanema technique thus: "the tubers are
peeled, grated on the spiny buttressed roots of Bac/Tis
palms, and the pulp, sorted by hand, is squeezed and
rolled in the pal ms of the hand . These balls of pulp are
then bound in , .. leaves ... and set in the ashes to cook.
So cooked the dried pulp that remains may be eaten in
a gourd of water" (1978: PI. II, sec. 6.2). Bitter manioc
is not a major part of the Sanema djet~ and if it were
the technique employed for processing it would be
totally inadequate. It is, therefore, of some importance
that the peoples to be compar ed wilh the T ukanoans of
the Northwest Amazon have bitter manioc as their
staple and employ a similar technology in processing the
root.

111
A good example is the Carib-speaking population of the
interior of Guiana. These people rely heavily on bitter
manioc and like the Tukanoans they use the lipili. or
manioc squeezer, which allows large quantities of manioc
pu lp to be processed quickly and wi th relatively little
effort - just by the sedentary weight of the worker on
the end of a lever. Of equal importance for the present
f,xe rcise is the marked difference in" social organiz.ation
between the two regions. Although these will have to be
discussed in greater detail tater, it might be noted now
that the Tukanoans are patrilineal and virHocal with
clear rules of settlement exogamy. The Caribs are
cognatic, tend towards uxorilocality and express a
preference for settleme-nt endogamy.

At the same time

th ey do share certain features. such as the structure of

the rela tionship terminology which in both cases is {woline prescriptive. I shall also argue that both political
economies are based on control over the productive and
reproducti ve capacities of people. above all of women.
182

As an aspect of this I shall cla im that the scarce

resource in the environment is not material. but the
men and women to exploit it.'
The first step in the comparison must be to examine
the procedures for processing rnanioc and to conside-f
certain expectations surroundi ng the end products. In
the Guiana region, the varjous stages in the preparation
of manioc are as foll ows: women (never a woman alone)
go to the f ield, dig the roots, and, if it is . the first
crop from that field, replant at the same time. The
roots are peeled e,jtheT at th e garde.n site or back in
the village. Any mud is washed off the peeled root
either in the river or in a bowl of water. The roolS are
then grated using either a board studded with stone
chips, which is the traditional instrument, or more often
today a piece of tin with holes punched in it, having a
resemblance to a flattened cheese grater. The grating is
done into a hollowed-out log, an old canoe or other
suitable Jarge container. The resulting pulp is fed into
the tipili and as the woman does tbis she squeezes out
some of the juice wi th her hands or with the help of a
sieve. After squeezing in the tipiti, the flour is removed
from it in the fo rm of solid, sausage-shaped blocks.
These may be left to dry for a while in the sun or even
over 3 fire, and in this condition flour can be stored
for some time without any harm coming to it. However,
the flour is normally used straightaway or at the latest
next day. The next stage consists of breaking up the
blocks either by crumbling in the hands or by poundmg
in a mortar. The flour is then sieved, and the fin est
flour is used for baking bread , although a certain
amount o f the coarser ma terial may be incorporated.
The flour is baked into large flat loaves on a griddle.
After baking, the loaves are put to dry . in the sun: an~
the fini shed product is a round, board-Ilke loaf wh1C~ 15
almost indestructible and can be stored for long peflods
without deterioration on condition that it is kept dry.
At least that is the most common product , although a
number 'of other sorts of bread are also made. M3?lOC
for ms the basis of many different drinks and in partJcu183

lar the fermented types that are an essential component

of political and ritual occasions. The juice that results
from squeezing can be rendered edible by boiling, and
the starch or tapioca that settles out of the juice forms
an ingredient in a number of different foods and drinks
As is to be expected\ a certain amount of variation i~
both the procedures and the products occurs from one
group to the next within the region and even from one
woman to another within the same village. The best
description of manioc processing and the resulting foodstuffs is provided by Yde \l,drh refere nce to the Waiwai
(J965:31-51).
Unlike some other parts of Amazonia. \Ve have few
Quantitative data from the Carib groups of Guiana on
how Indians occupy their time. Hurault reports that
Waiyana women spend 6.5 hours a 'week in thei r fields
7 hours in the making of manioc bread with an extr~
hour jf manioc beer is made a.s v..'el1 - that is to saYt
14.5 hours a week (1965:124). Although I did not keep
detailed figures for the Trio, a woman will normally go
through the whole process of making bread about once
every five days and take 1.5 days or approximately 12
hours to do ic Other ethnographers from the region do
no: suggest any great divergence from this pattern.
Inoee. d , the absence of exact fjgures is not a great
hand1cap because the contrast is so obviously great
wh en we compare the Guianan procedures with Tukanoan
practices.
ehdst;ne Hugh-Jones' account (1979:J 74-80) of the
practlces of the Tukanoan Barasana is the fullest we
have and the fonowing description is taken from it.
~1an~ of the stages are simitar to those we have just
descflbed. but there are some additional steps. The
women har vest t~e roots and replant as they go. The
roots are pee Jed m the garden and washed in the river
on the way home. Back at the house the roots are
grated; and the pulp transferred to a sieve supported on
a tripod. Here it is pounded and squeezed as water is
pOured over it. The aim is a division into three constituent parts: the fibers which stay in the sieve, and the
184

starch and the juice in a POI below where they are left
to separate out. The starch and fiber are stored in
holes dug in the ground while the juice is boiled up and
served as drink just before dusk, At the same time as
the juke is boiling the making of bread continues,
although the ingredients used are those which passed
through the earlier stages on some previous day and
have been stored in the ground. The fiber is squeezed
in the tiplti, turned out and sie"'ed. AB save the coarsest fibers which do not pass through the sieve. arc then
dried on the baking piate and resieved, This process is
repeated until the flour reaches what is considered to
be the right. fine consistency for it to be mixed with
the starch. Finally this mixture is baked into large, flat
loaves.
What clearly differentiates the Tukanoan Indian praclice from that of the Guianan Indian is that the whole
process is not simply longer and more complex, but that
it is performed daily. This paper started wi th a quote
from Hugh-Jones to this effect and to show that the
Barasana are not exceptional; reference can be made to
the work of other authors. Thus Goldman wriles of the
Cubeo that "under ordinary conditions. the rou tine of
manioc preparation is daily' (1963:62). Of the Mak una,
Arhem states "every day at noon, after retu rning from
the gardens, the women process the daily harvest of
manioc' (1981:66). Jackson, in her turn, mentions that
the Bani usualIy go through the whole process of manioc processing daily (1983:52). The Tubnoan area is not
much better off than Guiana for quantitative data on
th is matter, but a rew figures are available. Goldman
estimates that 11 Cubeo woman spends 42 hours a week
on the preparation of manioc bread. and if one includes
manioc beer and farinha the annual average rises to
nine hours a day or 63 hours a week in processing
manioc products (ibid:58). Arbem puts the average figure
for adult h1akuna women at 7-8 hours a day on subsistence work (idem), and Dufour has calculated that Tatuvo women devote over 6 hours a day to food acqui;ition, most of the time spent in processing manIoc

185

(1983:348). Inadequately detailed as these figures are

they certainly indicate a very different state of affai rs
fro m tha t found in Guiana and it is clear that th e time
~aken by Tukanoan women in processing manioc is far
In excess
of that taken by Waiyana women. whom
Hurault reckons to have a to tal work ing week of 48
hours of which 40 per cent is taken up with worki ng
cotton I an activity often conducted in the comfort of a
ha mmock (idem).
To summa rize the arg ument so far: There should no
longer be any doubt that the Tukanoan women of Ihe
Nort,hwest Amaz.on spend far mOre tjme processing
rnanJ0c, than do their counterparts in Gu iana. It cannot
be cl med that as a result of this the peo ple of Guiana
go short of manioc-based foods. Indeed the extra time
devoted by Tukanoan women to manioc processing ca n
!,e acco unted fo r quite simply by two factors. The first
1S that ~he process is longer and more complex, and the
se~ond IS that the whole process is normally carr jed out
d al ly. T he re. seem no grounds for claiming thaI the
~mount of lIme expended and the degree of elaboration
Involved result from any intrinsk qu ality of the manioc
root. , J~de,e<i!.. ,everYl,h,ing po.i.l:us to~'aras th~ , involvemen t
of socIal and cultural factors. It is at th ese we will
look next.
IV

Now it might be argued that the difference we have

noted between the two areas is basjcally an aesthetic
one. In other VI ords. the Tu kan oans. in ins ist ing on
fres~ bread and drink daily, are the gourmets of the
tro':lCal forest and appreciate good food more than the
Cartbs do. Although) have had no first-hand experience
of Tukanoan food, it does sound rather more appetizing
than the Canb food I do kn ow, The Caribs do know
how to make a wide range of manioc-based products and
do take great care over makin g them (Yde notes 27
fOT,ms of . manioc-based food and drink am ong the Waiwa.), It. IS just thaI they do not do it frequently, let
alone dally, bu t only for special occasions. Most of the
J86

time they are content not to eat fres h bread. On the

other hand , the Tukaooans expect to eat well every day
and 001 just on high da ys and holidays. O ne could leave
it there and just accept th at this is a matter of taste
and there is nothing more to be said about it. However:--)
the price the Tukanoans, or at least their women, have t
to pay fo r their haUlf cuisine is tha t manioc processi ng \\
becomes a daily chore and thus occupies a very large ,/
amount of an adult woman's time. This cannot fail to ;,
hav e im pl jcations for the soc ial orga ni zation, It is to '\
this aspect that we must now turn our attention.
My argument _from t.his; poiTl_t_ on j~ that the: _ duration,
of ' female involve men t in man ioc ,'Pfocessing, has """ to, do
v.'ith the degree to which a communit y exerts coptrol
over its- female re so~ rces (which. for convenience sake,
v.'ill be expressed as men's control over women although
th is descri ption m ore aptly app lies to the Tubnoan than
the Carib pc.oples). The more direct and assured this
control t he less need th e re is for men to resort to
cuHuralmechanis ms to bolste r it. It is important here
to stress that v.'hat is meant by control in this cont,=xt
is li ttle more than men~s abilit y to handle the female
re sources available, so that women'"s productive and
re productive ca pacities on one hand. and thei r exchange
value on the other, are not lost to them, The mechanisms which I have identified as being involved are two,
and we will look at them firs t in a gene ra.! way before
going on to consider them in relation to the differences
in socia! organization in the two chosen regions. That .
mechan ism to w hich I attac h more importance witt be <'referred to as "routinization" and the other, secondary
rnechanLsm as "expropriation", I will djscuss the latter
first.
Expropriation relates to the fale of the val ue of a
product, in this case manioc products. Value does not
the importance of manioc as the staple crop! as
refer
just food t although there does seem to be some variation in native recogn ition of this. The Trio are well
aware of how essential manioc is in their diet~ whereas,
according to Goldma n (ibid:58), the Cubeo rath er play

to

187

'f

down its importance (although it would seem to me that

they are denigrating the contribution of women rather
than manioc per se). Nor does value refer to the undm.l~ted prestige a woman can gain through the high
quahty and large quantity of her bread and beer. Certainly she can obtain such prestige, but only in the
domestic arena; her reward is related to her competence
as a baker or brewer, and can go no funher than this.
In this respect it contrasts sharply with the male equivalent. the good hunter. who can transform his prowess
in the economic sphere in to a number of different
advantages. Although 1 have no clear evidence for it I
suggest that the
that a woman may earn from
her activities is a sort of consolation prize to be competed for among women only.
The expropriation to which I refer concerns the value
of manioc products, and above all beer, in the political
sphere. It is women who make the beer but it is the
men who give it away at dances and rituals and to
whom political profi t accrues from the giving. Women
lose control, not over its nutritional value but its
political value. The relationship in Amazonia between
Jeadership and polygyny has often been pointed out. The
archetypal case is that where the good hunter through
the provision of a surplus of meat is able to attract and
then maintain more women. The surplus production of
these women is then used in giving feasts that will
advance the man~s political career. This is a vastly
oversimplified descript ion but it does contain grains of
truth; that political advancement does depend on the
su.rplus of female production, and that a political career
';"lH advance w1th the number of women whose produchon one controls - be these mothers, sisters, wives,
daughters or daughters-in-law. In other words, the value
o.r processed manioc, other than its day~to-day nutriho.nal .. value ~ is not accessible to women but is expropnated by men. I would argue that this is broadlv true
throughout the tropical forest region. The eff~cl of
~xpropriation is that a woman cannot act autonornotisly
tn the public political arena (or at least only rarely),
188

this
not mean that she necessarily lacks
political influence.
By routinization I refer to the way in which, through
the division of labor ) a particular segment of the population finds itself consigned to tasks that are considered
essential but are at the same time routine. By nature
they require little initiative, ideally deter experirnentation 1 are legitimated by some higher authorjty~ and
often include various actions which arc nOt technically
necessary_ Tasks which exhibit these features may often
be a means of keeping people artificiaHy occupied
through fear of what they
do jf they have time
on their hands. Christine Hugh-Jones has some highly
relevant remarks to make on this as far as the Barasana
are concerned (1978:49). "The fact that manioc is
staple, the nature of the crop as such and the
vidual character of women's v,-'ork all combine to
women less choice over how they spend their time
me n. ... Besides being controlled by constant demand,
femaie manioc production is more rigidly structured than
male activities because it actually takes nearly a whole
day to complete. ... The daily rhythm of manioc production dominates the lives of an women."
However t what is interesti ng is that despite the
commitment to this fulI-time and repetltne task it
wouId not appear to be seen or felt as a chore. Goldman. when comparing men's and women~s work, describes the letter as bordering on drudgery but goes on
to v,Tite that it would be \vrong to stress this aspect
(ibid:87). Indeed, Christine Hugh-Jones, who has considerable experience of manioc processing, "came to
enjoy much of the daily routine {of manioc processing]
for its own sake" (l979:xiv). Shirley Ardener bas also
noted that it is the very pettiness of such tlme-consuming activities as sewing~ which occupied certain
classes of women in 19th century England, that "may
give them their force. Those who~ while pursuing them t
come to enjoy them for thei r own sake are kept in
happy and harmless occupation"(1978:19). There is 'no
suggestion that manioc processing is a petty occupation;
189

it is an. essential activity. However, these remarks are

relevant In so far as they point up the fact that most

people do what is expected of them without Question.
Furthermore,

the

ve ry

nature

of

bitter

manioc

gives

women little choice but to follow traditional proced ures.

AFter aU. manioc is poisonous and accordingly it is
lughiy unhkely that anyone is going to experiment with
short cuts in the traditional way of making the root

edibJe.

and divisions within the patrilineage (1963;150, 160,

1&3, 216, 288-9, 290). This view is supported by Jackson
with reference to the Bara (1983: 130), and by Arhern
who agrees tha t the incorporation of women

However, this still does not expiain \\'hy the process

is undertaken daily (un!ess we are just ha ppy to accept
that the Tukanoans like fresh bread every day). To
understand thIS we must look for t he force that legitimates such behavior. Once again the answer is provided
very cl~ariY by Christine Hugh-Jones who, in the passage ~Hed at the beglnning of this art ide, having
recognized the fact that the Tukanoans are exceptional
a;nong Amazonian Indians with regard to manioc processmg, goes o n to locate the prac tice vdthin the Barasana's ritual framework. She is carefu1 to insist that
manioc processing itself is not "ritual". but that "the
technologically essential elements refer metapho ricaliy to
the . processes of reproduction of social groups ... the
manlOC process is seen as a female counterpan of the
male Yurupary rites" (1979: 181-2). In other words, the
Tuk:.noan .m~nlo~ processing receives legitimation by its '
10Clldon wlthm fltual; the means by which the Barasana
rn~ke sense of the universe in which they live. The
dai~y routine is pan of the cosmic cycl~. By contrast in
GU1ana~ there is no daily cycie of manioc processing

backed

social orga nization it wiil be useful to examine biiefly

how the nature of women is viewe d in the two areas,
G oldman sa ys of the Cubeo that in - marrying wom en are
rega rded as ~ a disruptive influence, as sexualiy aggressive
and as responsible for the adultery that creates conflict

by the expectation of

fresh

bread and

drink

e~ery day and legitimat',d by a metaphorical association

w1th a wider ritual cycle. The existence of this associated . set among the Tukanoan groups results in the
mystical legitimization of the women's routine and has
the effect of providing women with a highly structured
and full day..
}

V
Before proceeding to relate this difference to aspects of
190

into the

local descent group is problematic for the M akuna (1985;

pers. com.), although it is men rather than women who
are the initiators of sexual affairs (l98l:l72-3). HughJones provides a st ructural rather than a conflic tive
account of the dissolution of the patrilineal group
caused by in-marrying v,/omen whom she describes as
"both creators and destroyers" (1979;161-2). As Jackson
has pointed out, the prating of blame for disruption on
in-ma rrying women is widely characteristic of patrilineal
and patrilocal societies where it is important to maintain the solidarity of the men. In the Guiana region,
\vith its cognatic and uxoriiocal organization. women do
not represen t the same problem. While a community win
be concerned with the f a te of its women, they are not
seen as constituting a threat to it Indeed, women tend
to be seen as the passive participants in affairs and
unable 10 resist the demands of men. It they are blamed
for anything it is their inability to say ~ n o" . Let us now
tu rn to conslder the social organization.
In Guiana, marriage is preferabl y settlement-endogamous and if it is not. it is usually uxorilocaL A man's
or woman's daughter re m ains under his: or her direct

control. The control that parents exercise , both jurally

and affectively, over their daughters is the basis of
what authority they are able to exert over their sonsin-law. It was mentioned earlier that people, and above
women who have productive and reproductive potential J are the ultimate scarce resource in the tropical
forest. This statement needs to be qualified by adding

an

that the re need not be an absolute shortage of women

in order for them to be regarded as being in short
191

i<~~1~:l;-

Ina
where settlements contain about 30
i a n d a r e about a days walk apart~ where there is
nref""nce for settlement endogamy, and strangers are
<loOke,! on if not with hostility then at least with suspithen from the viewpoint of any given individual
of available women looks very limited. Add
the notion that it is only through marriage that
adult status. together with the ec{:)nomic and social

which accompanies it, can be achieved, the

(impolrla:nce attached to controlling women becomes
Herein lies the control that parents have over
daughter's husband who, in the event of dispute,
the choice of submitting to his parents-in-laws' wiiI
,.taying with lhe wife he has, or surrendering his

in-marrying woman particularly a newlywed) by stubborn refusal to cooperate and to fulfill the obligations
of a wife (perhaps even by running home) can destroy
not only her own marriage but also that of the woman
for whom she was exchanged . In the Guiana region a
woman
herself in such a position, and there
is little advantage for an in-marrying man from being
uncooperative since he has everything to lose and
nothing to gain thereby. If a man wishes to take his
wife elsewhere it is up to his ability to negotiate with
her parents and persuade her to go with him.
Amazon control o'ver women and
J

m the uncertain hope of finding another elsewhere.

Parent< can only exercise such control while their

remain at home, in other words under either

or uxorilocaJ arrangements.
contrast with this is the situation in the Northv.,.est
Amazon where settlement exogamy and virHocaJ residence are the rules. Control over women in these
circumstances is a rather different matter. Arhem (J98l)
and Jackson (1983) indicate that Women are a highly
valued and none too ptenriful reSOurce in the area. But
the problem is that one has to surrender control over
onefs Own \\'omen in order for them to be replaced from
a var iety of different Sources. One is left in the posj~
tion of having no complete control over any woman
because even if one re tains part control "'over the woman
Whom one has given 3;\\'ay one in tUrn gains only part
?ontrol over the woman rece,ived in exchange. This point
made very clearly by Arhem (idern:152-4) when de-

1S

scribing various marriage strategies. The most complete

control that can be gained over women results from
marriage by capture but, paradoxicallv Ihis is the form
of union least likely !o succeed. If ii' does succeed then
the woman's kin live such a distance away they can no
longer exercise any control and it effectively passes to
the husband's group. Arhern also indicates thai women
are rar from passive pawns in the marriage game. An
192

the subsistence diet. The

accompanied by a long
process which, in turn , is backed by a metaphorical
relationship between the daily subsistence cycle and the
life cvde which bestow meaning on one another, operates to allow women little freedom of action. This
stands in stark contrast with the situation in Guiana
where the rather more certain control over women is
associated v.,"ith a far less structured routine. Two
aspects of this deserve further consideration. First, in
Guiana the female core of settlement is composed of
mothers, sisters and daughters, and it can be soundly
argued that these women, forming a close-knit group,
are in a stronger position to exert their independence
than are the in-marrying women; often from different
settlements and speaking different languages, in a
Tukanoan settlement. I would agree with this and claim
lhat it is a corollary of the rule of postmarital residence, the main factor thaI determines what sort of
need there is to exert control over women in the first
place.s
The second, which
193

more freedom of action they can be afforded. In other

words tight restrictions on women's behavior do Mt
indicate that men have co ntrol but ra ther that the v are
insecure about it. This suggestion may seem to
in
the face of common sense but a quick glance at the
large literature on honor and shame in Mediterranean
countries provides some support for it. With reference
to that area it may be argued that the limitations
imposed on female behavior indicate that men have a
high degree of control ove,r women < However, the question is why is behavior so curtailed jf men feel secure
about their womenfolk? The ans\\-'cr seems to be that
men do not feel secure (not in the Mediterranean area
over the actual supply but over an assumed qual ity of
womanhood; the poten tia] threat female nature represents to another scarce resource, honor) and th e similarity bet'.\./een the Tukanoans and the Greek v.,omen of
Piraeus studied by Hirschon (1978) is striking. In a
section entitled "Time and Temptation" (ibid.:82-4),
Hirschon describes vividly how a woman's time is fully
occupied, often with trivial and repetitive tasks. "A
woman's domestic duties are extremely time-consuming
'" and this is a feature of great significance. The logic
of the dictates regarding a wornan~s time is clear: she
should be fully occupied around the house to prevent
the possibility of temptation. ... Quickly prepared meals
indicate laziness or ignorance of proper cooking methods. Far worse, though, they lea ve the housewife free
time in which she might easily get into misohief.,e
Furthermore, as in the case of Piraeus, control over
Tukanoan women is no! limited to the sphere of domestic tasks. Two further areas in which women are
subordinated can be recognized and in both cases a
contrast with the Guiana region can be noted. First t the
Northwest Amazon culture is characterized by rituals in
which sacred musical instruments~ which women are
forbidden to see, play an important part. During rituals
women spend much of the time secluded behind a partition at the end of the house condemned to the role of
invisible audience. On the other hand, in Guiana there

ny

194

is a marked absence of sacred objects that women may

not seet and almost everywhere women participate
actively in ritual events.
..
Second t it is men of the Tukanoan patnhne "\\-"ho . are
responsible for its social continu ity" which they achIeve
through male initiation rites. In Ihls way they expr?priate from women, who are excluded from membershIp
of the patriline into whkh they marry, the powers of
social reproduction, and at the same time. devalue the
biological aspec t. Through much of GUlana, female
initiation rites are as important as male ntes or more
so and in the absence of social units the stress tends to
be on the creation of the individual. In this both s~:xes
have a part to piay, and although often some ~ex hnking is apparent~ men being more concErned ':'..'lth. men,
women with women, there is not the subordmatlOn of
the female role that is 'to be found among the T ukanoans.

VI
I would like to conclude this pa per on a more general
note. Claude t1ei11assoux in his A1aJdcns, Aleal D,nJ
Money (1981) distinguishes between t\.\'o types of SOCletV' those in which women are im mubile and men move
the m; referred to as
and those in V,th~ch
men stay put and women move.. called . gynecom~~lJe.
Gynecostatism is normally assoc.lated WIth matnl~~y,
matrilocality and root cultivation, and synecomoblhry
with patriliny, patrilocality
an.d
cere.al
agr~culture .
Except for the cultivation practices. whIch l\~el:lassoux
accepts may be found with either SOCIal fon~~ It IS dear
that the Guianan societies are gynecostattc and th~
Tukanoans gynecomobHe. However, the Tukanoans f:t
rather better h1eiHassoux's description of a gynecostatic
society than do the Guianans. He argues that in 1I
gynecostatic society. should there be a s~D:tage. of
women this can only be rectified through nndmg SInce
the so;iety lacks other mechanisms by which :0 make
good the shortfall. Thus hunters bec?me warno:s and
hunt women instead of animals. ThiS results m the

to'

195

subordination of women whose safety depends on submission to one group of men or another. \Vornen are
'made inferior because of their social vulnerability ..,
and are given the least re\\ia rding, the most tedious and,
above all, the least gratifying tasks such as agriculture
and cooking" (jbid:29). Now women aU over Amazonia
are responsible for the tasks of cooking and agriculture,
but we have noted that in the Northwest Amazon they
are much more fully occupied with food, particularly
manioc processing. than are their counterparts in Guiana. Further the Carib-speaking peoples of Guiana are
relatively unwarlike and raiding for women is a rather
rare occurrence. Indeed there are several mechanisms by
which demographic imbalances may be rectified. The
Tukanoan case is more complex. Raiding for women does
occur and when it does raiders, according to Arhem. see
themselves as going hunting. However, raiding only
occurs when there arc no women available through
normal exchange and negotiation, and wife capture is
practiced only from distant people with whom it would
prove difficult to make negotiated arrangements.
MeiHassoux assumes that gynecomobHe societies depend "on the political capacities of the communities to

It has been argued in this paper that one of the

means by which control 1s maintained o'ver human scarce
resources is through the division of labor. In Tukanoan
sotietv the djvision of labor consigns to women a series
of d~ily tasks that severely restricts their freedom of
action, and it is in this society that control over the
supply of wome n is not always assured. This state of
affairs is . in marked contrast with what we found in
Guiana where a far less arduous routine is associated
with the retention rather than the dispersal of femaJe
resources. In other words the vital factor influencing
the freedom in \l;'omen's lives appears to be the ruie of
postmarital residence for this determines the degree of
the con trol the community exerts over its female resources . This study needs to be extended to incorporate
other examples, but at the moment this is \\ihat the
comparison of Tuk3nDan~ and GUlanan culinary practices
suggests.

NOTES

negotiate an adequate number of women at all times"

(op.cit.:25, italics in original). However t this is not a
feature of Tukanoan communities becau5e ~ among other
things f the institution of bridewealth is poorly developed
and the only value that can be exchanged for a woman
is another woman. At the heart of the lisue lies control
over female resources~ and in the absence of an exchange mechanism that guarantees the return of a
,,:oman to replace one given away~ gynecomobife sode!les are faced with certain problems not experienced by
gynecostatic societies~ in wh.ic-h, by definition. femaie
resources are assured. In other words the Guianan
peoples have chosen a safe but ultimately stultifying
option in which there is little scope to expand networks. The Tukanoans have made a first hesitant step
towards a more open system, but have failed to exorcise
the shadow of uxoriJocality!

1 This
paper was presented in earlier versions at
semin:us in the, Departments of Sodal Anthropology at
Cambridge University, the London School of Economics,
and },1anchester University. I am extremely grateful to
the members of those departments for their numerOUS
heipful suggestions and construct ive criticisms.

196

197

The complexity of the manioc processing means that

it is the bottleneck in the production Ene. There would
be no trouble in clearing and planting much larger areas
of manioc, but without an adjustment in the division of
labor ail the roots would never get processed. However~
before the advent of metal goods, above aU axes, it is
more than likely that fields were smaller and it required
much more labor on the part of men to prepare them.
In other words, what we observe in the tropical forest

today is the resuh of a relatively new technological

revolution that has almost entirely advantaged men at
the expense of women,

1 Although the nature of his argument is rather dirrerent, Turner (1979), in pointing to the central importance of uxorilocality in the social structure G~ and
Bororo socie,ties~ has strongly influenced my ideas.

S For a
fuller discussion of this point and others
directly related to the argument contained in this paper,
see Riviere 1984, in particular Chapters 7 and 8.

4: ~1anioc processing is not the only example of routiniz:ation among the Tukanoans. or at least among the
Barasana. A rather similar process is to be found in the

elaborate and daily preparation of coca. The more

routine tasks are performed by young men under the
supervision
case it is
rather than
and Stephen

of the older men v.,'hich suggests that in this

a matter of control of eJder over younger
men over women. I am "'fateful to Christine
Hugh-Jones for drawing this to my attention.

6 Although it fails outside the

with which we
are concerned it is worthwhile mention ing the ~1undu
rueu case. Y. and R. t..lurphy ""rite that "the J\1"undufucu
pattern of residence [Le,. uxorlio'::aI] is a bulwark of
female status" (1974:215). They claim that there is a fair
degree of equality between men 2.nd \.\'omen because the
latter control the products of their labor. However) it is
not at all dear that this is true except with reference
to the nutritional vslue of the food since here as
elsewhere in Amazonia men appear to expropria te the
sociopolitical value. The Mundurucu would be an excellent example with which to extend this study. The
Kmkuru of the Upper Xingu are another good case for
which there is plenty of information (see Carneiro 1983
~nd Dole 1978) and they provide an interesting contrast
m so far as they stOre manioc flour.

e One has heard similar complaints in Great Britain

that housewives freed by mechanization from household
chores indulge in s.uch vices as afternoon bingo sessions
and cheap supermarket sherry.

J98

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201