9.2 (Summer 1985) Identity and Education

Dorje was only four years old in 1962 when the Chinese army advanced across the Tibetan frontier into India. In what is now known as the "Assam Incident," the Chinese began shelling the tiny Himalayan town of Bomdila. Dorje's older sister picked him up at school and held his hand tightly as the two of them raced for home. Artillery boomed in the nearby hills and the main street was full of the roar of Indian army trucks filled with soldiers.

"Cultural and physical genocide must be opposed wherever it occurs."

It is high time we recognized the preservation of endangered peoples for what it is: not simply an act of commiseration, but, above all, an act of self-preservation. For, among those peoples, everything our industrialized, utilitarian age has taken from us is preserved, at least in vestigial form.

Guatemalan Indians have responded to population growth in ways that conflict with the role the state has assigned them.

Most countries in Latin America, in the course of the present century, have experienced what is commonly known as a "population explosion." However, many of these same countries, four centuries ago, underwent a "population collapse" the severity of which, viewed in aggregate, probably exceeded any demographic disaster ever recorded by history.

Clitoridectomy and infibulation, commonly known as female circumcision, are practices found in many African cultures. The reasons for their development are not known.

I, Rigoberta Menchu

Edited and introduced by Elisabeth Burgos-Debray

Translated by Ann Wright

Verso/Schocken, 1984, $8.95

Rigoberta Menchu is one of the few surviving members of a Guatemalan Indian family that has paid a blood price to plantation owners, to corrupt government officials, and to the military. This is her story, told over the course of a week in simple but eloquent Spanish - the elite language of Guatemala that she learned in self-defense.

Indian relocation in Central America is a result of the assertion of colonial or national authority over indigenous cultures. In order to avoid violence, native communities have abandoned traditional territories, moving into more marginal areas which are outside the control of the dominant society. Most Indian groups surviving in Central America today have lost much of their traditional territory. The Darién Chocó of eastern Panama, however, are an exception.

On Monday, April 28, 1985, the Nicaraguan Government released 14 prisoners charged with participation or association with the armed resistance movements, MISURASATA and MISURA.

The Sinu River flows down from the mountains of Colombia's northern Antioquia province. It descends through the plains of central Cordoba, passes through the city of Monteria, and spreads into a lowland swamp before emptying into the Caribbean.

Highland Lao refugees in the United States face serious crises of survival in their new environment.

Last October, Americans became aware of the tragedy taking place in Ethiopia and responded with the largest outpouring of humanitarian assistance in memory. Relief agencies attempted to supply food and assistance to famine victims as quickly as possible; everyone assumed that the famine was the result of a drought - a "natural" disaster. Soon, however, because of difficulties in getting food to many famine victims, agencies began to question whether this famine was totally nature-made.

Indigenous people are found in varying numbers in most countries of Asia and the Pacific; throughout the region they have much in common.

Each morning Shuar Indian children in the southern Amazonian region of eastern Ecuador, gather in groups in their respective centros or villages from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.

In the Philippines, three Hanunoo communities have initiated an alternative education program to standard Philippine education. It is hoped that an education more sensitive to their culture will enable Hanunoo to develop skills essential for self-determination in their changing world. Organizing the new school has called for collaboration between Hanunoo, external support agencies, teachers and administrators. A ten-year project illustrates the importance of such collaboration and the need to base educational systems on the expressed needs of the community served by this school.

Twenty-nine years after Mrs.

The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) was founded in 1968 after the 38th International Congress of Americanists met in Stuttgart.