The Pristine Myth, and Neoliberal Politics Terra nullius, derived from Roman law, meaning “land belonging to no one,” empty land. During European colonialism the doctrine gave legal precedent to settlement of lands occupied by “backward” people, where no European system of laws or ownership of property was held to exist. As the indigenous people were not (in this view) using the land, those who could cultivate the land had a right to claim it.

“In the beginning all the World was America” John Locke, 1690 Res (terra) nullius

Columbus Cannibal Rousseau Hobbes Amazons primitive Homer Green Hell Garden of Eden Savage El Dorado Léry archaic Dog-snouted warriors stone- age Hobbes Images of Amerindians

The Handbook of South American Indians ( ) the tropical forest tribe: i.e., you get (in the past) what you see (in 20 th century), or, the “one size fits all Amazonian Indian” band state chiefdom tribe

Early contact with Xavante, central Brazil Saturday Evening Post, 03/15/47 “Uncontacted Amazonian Tribe Photographed” Envira peoples (Telegraph 05/29/08) “Brazil Opens the West” “Battling dense jungles, defying hostile Indians and angry insects, these few modern frontiersmen are breaking a path that will bring civilization to a wilderness empire that encompasses 2,000,000 square miles” Saturday Evening Post, March 15, 1947

“O cacique Paulinho Paiakan, da reserva etica das matas tropicais, estupra uma estudante e permanece livre” (1992) “Assassinato do lider seringueiro Chico Mendes em Xapuri, no Acre, provoca revolta no mundo inteiro” (1989) “THE SAVAGE,” and the Innocent Eles marcaram a década Veja, 30 Anos,

GOLD HYDRO-DAMS WOOD and, amber waves of Soy Assault on Paradise, or the Taming of the Amazon

From Goulding et al THE SOY FRONTIER

Deforestation around southern PIX Source:

“A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin 2005) The Battle for the Amazon: Conservation, Development, and Science-Friction

Source: “A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin, 2005)

Kaiapo medicine man, Brazil. Photo: Sue Wren From pictures/wren-shaman-1.html (3/28/06) Warriors from the upper Xingú region of Brazil participating in the Quarup ceremony. From Conservation International's Wilderness: Earth's Last Wild Places © Russell Mittermeier

Cartoon: Khalil Bendib, from “Conservation at All Costs: How Industry-Backed Environmentalism Creates Violent Conflict Among Indigenous Peoples” By Shefa Siegel, Special Report to CorpWatch December 22nd, 2003

Images of the Rainforest Amity Doolittle (Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies): “Without deep reflection on the images and rhetoric that surround the rain forest, how can we really know what it is we are trying to ‘save’?” Is it the jungles of our imaginations teeming with exotic flora and fauna that must be protected? Or, is it the gardens, orchards, and forests of resident peoples that need our attention. And what are we trying to save it for? Is it to safeguard the vast repository of undiscovered pharmaceuticals, minerals, and oils? Or is it to comfort ourselves that the ‘lungs of the world’ are continuing to compensate for our extravagant lifestyles? More than just an entertaining exercise in deconstruction, probing what lies behind the iconic and simplified representations associated with rain forest preservation has significant consequences for its inhabitants and the resources it contains.” (Review of Candice Slater’s “Searching for the Rainforest,” 2003, American Anthropologist)

International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC) is the Caucus of Indigenous representatives from across the globe in UN Climate Change negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol

Source: Stickler et al. 2008

% % 2035 “Business as Usual” Source: Stickler et al. 2008; United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Conference of the Parties (COP), Fourteenth session, 1-12 December 2008, Poznan, Poland

GrassTrees

“An Amazon Culture Withers as Food Dries Up” (NYTimes, 7/24/09) “Tacuma, the tribe’s wizened senior shaman, said that the only threat he could remember rivaling climate change was a measles virus that arrived deep in the Amazon in 1954, killing more than 90 percent of the Kamayurá.”