The Canela People Subsistence Patterns and Economics

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The Canela People are native to Brazil, populating the zone in-between the Amazon basin and the Northeast (“Brazil’s Canela Indian Festivals” 1). Their diet has evolved greatly over time as they came into contact with the outside world. Historically, they were more of a food foraging people than horticulturalists, meaning they mostly scavenged wild plants, roots, nuts and eggs, fished, and practiced limited hunting of tapir, deer, emu, boar, paca, cutia, and fox. Up until the 19th century, the Canela relied only 20% on horticulture (“Canela” 1). In their limited practice the Canela grew manioc, maize beans, squash, peanuts and sweet potatoes (“Canela” 1). The Canela’s hunting and food foraging ways shifted around 1814 when they first made contact with the Europeans. The Canela and Europeans conflicted over several issues. Primarily, the two groups clashed over cattle. The European’s cattle lured the Canela; they often raided plantations and killed cattle in large numbers. The Canela were eventually resettled onto merely five percent of their previous land and thus forced to change their subsistence patterns (Crocker "Journal of the Society" 33). With less land, they did not have the same access to recourses for foraging. Instead, they adopted the slash- and-burn Brazilian farming techniques. Additionally, the Europeans influenced the Canela’s subsistence by teaching them to cultivate watermelons, sugar cane, rice and bananas; with the capability to grow more crops, the Canela shifted away from food foraging and towards horticulture. The Canela have since been relocated several times to different reservations.

Currently, the Canela are primarily horticulturalists, meaning they practice small-scale farming techniques and raise a...

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