![\"Julie](\"\/pardeeschool\/files\/2017\/03\/Klinger1.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nJulie Klinger,<\/a>\u00a0Assistant Professor of International Relations at the\u00a0<\/span>Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, was recently interviewed for an article in the\u00a0Pardee Periodical<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0the graduate student academic journal at the\u00a0Pardee School, on\u00a0<\/i>her research with Yanomami communities and the importance of indigenous voices in the Amazon.<\/span><\/p>\n The article<\/a>, the latter half of a two-part interview, was published on March 21, 2018 and was written by Pardee School\u00a0<\/span><\/i>M.A. Candidate in International Relations and Environmental Policy\u00a0Philip Horowitz. You can read the first half of the interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n From the text of the article:<\/p>\n Horowitz:<\/b>\u00a0There are some claims that date back to the 1960\u2019s by anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon that have given popular discourse many misconceptions of the Yanomami and their culture. How do you think these misconceptions should be addressed in a positive way?<\/span><\/p>\n Klinger:<\/b>\u00a0So the interesting thing about the Chagnon controversy is how well known it is among the Yanomami people. Napoleon Chagnon\u2019s book sold millions of copies and was reprinted dozens of times. By painting the Yanomami as a fierce people who are cannibals, whose entire economy was based on war and mistreating women \u2013 it then fed into the Brazilian military dictatorship\u2019s perception that indigenous people needed to be exterminated or assimilated. That may not have been Chagnon\u2019s intention, but that was the outcome. Rather than work to rectify the damage done by his work or to engage in a productive dialogue with the community, he has instead chosen to do nothing and none of the proceeds from his book went back to any of the communities; they went into building things like vacation homes.<\/span><\/p>\n The Yanomami are aware of this, and they\u2019re angry about it. But they have a particular relationship to the state and European-descended society such that this was just one of many instances of abuse that they\u2019ve experienced. The important thing in dispelling negative stereotypes that were unleashed, propagated, or reinforced by Napoleon Chagnon\u2019s work is not to romanticize the Yanomami or any indigenous society. Already, based on my limited experience working with them, it has become clear to me that their society has a lot of the problems and a lot of the power struggles that our society has \u2013 particularly when it comes to questions of equality, gendered violence, and many other things.<\/span><\/p>\n These issues in some Yanomami communities are familiar for those of us who live in urban America. So the way to address this is the same way we\u2019d go about addressing social injustice just about anywhere. We can start here at home, by addressing injustices among ourselves as well as dispelling the misconceptions held about other people \u2013 and that is just as good as working collaboratively with a community on the other side of the world.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n