“Quem chegou foi Kalankó!”: resistências e tramas indígenas no Alto Sertão alagoano (1980-2017)

Abstract

The Kalankó indigenous people survive in the rural area of the municipality of Água Branca, approximately 300 km away from the capital of Alagoas, Maceió. They are one of the resilient ethnic groups in the region, since their ancestors, who came from the hinterlands of Pernambuco, settled in the territory that now corresponds to the Januária, Gregório, and Lajeiro do Couro villages. In this way, we analyze the different characteristics of the relationships between indigenous people and the surrounding society, composed of nonindigenous individuals and official organizations, based on documentary records associated with specific images and narratives. The Kalankó protagonism has been emphasized from an interdisciplinary theoretical perspective encompassing fields such as History, Anthropology, Sociology, and Geography. This approach enables sensitive interpretations of indigenous interests and everyday details related to mobilizations and community contexts. Our methodological framework is grounded in the micro-historical analysis proposed by Ginzburg (1989), regarding the interpretation of clues inherent to individual trajectories, as well as in the practice of Oral History advocated by Alberti (2004). This method involves the intricate process of recording, capturing interview environment details, transcription, and study of the derived material. Theoretically, we engage with various concepts according to authors such as Amorim (2017), Samain (2012), Chartier (2002), Certeau (1998), Peixoto (2018), Herbetta (2011), Silva (2017), and other scholars whose writings have contributed to the bibliographic investigation of the Kalankó indigenous people and the theoretical analysis connected to the paradigms of the New Cultural History. This approach is interested in subjects who were generalized in the formerly considered official historiography. Therefore, we discuss images and narratives originating from interviews, photographs, journalistic records, official documents, and other indications related to the Kalankó indigenous people during the transition between the 20th and 21st centuries. This encompasses particularities, contradictions, and instances of protagonism.