The Name of the Relation: Making a Difference in Aweti Onomastics. Issue 2 (1st June 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Vanzolini, Marina
• Is Part Of: Social analysis. Volume 63:Issue 2(2019)
• Page Start: 102
• Page End: 121
• Publication Date: 2019-06-01
• Subjects: Aweti -- identity -- descent -- lineage -- onomastics -- Tupi -- Upper Xingu; Sociology -- Periodicals; Ethnology -- Periodicals; Social sciences -- Periodicals; Ethnology; Social sciences; Sociology; Electronic journals; Periodicals; 301.05
• DOI: 10.3167/sa.2019.630206
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0155-977X

Abstract

Abstract : Taking as a starting point an apparently minor event during my fieldwork—the fact that I received an indigenous name from the Aweti, a Tupi-speaking people who inhabit the upper reaches of the Xingu River—this article explores how personal qualities are elicited through names. A presentation of the Aweti onomastic system will highlight its analytical potential to interpret not only the case in question, but also a native theory of descent centered on the familial transmission of chiefdom. Personal names emerge as a way of producing people by evoking specific relations, while simultaneously particularizing the named person. Making a difference from what she or he was before having it, a name operates as a counter-identity device at the same time that it engenders identity qualities.