Saleha Erdmann :: Development Studies

When I often asked Urubicheña people if it was important to them to be Guarayo, it was common for someone to look at me as if the answer were obvious, “Of course, it’s very important.” It was not difficult to interview about this topic. Everyone speaks Guarayo in Urubichá. Many of the children and elderly don’t know how to speak Spanish. “Urubichá is the only one of the Guarayo towns that has maintained its Guarayo culture,” a man at a party explained to me. In many places they no longer speak Guarayo or maintain their own Carnaval traditions. Today almost all the old culture is lost, Salomón Cara Mondori (2005) told me, but some parts have survived.

Many people told me that to speak Guarayo is an important part of the culture and identity of the Guarayos. Cara Mondori has led a project to publish the first Guarayo dictionary. In the dedication he writes,

There are many other aspects of what it means to be Guarayo besides language. A young man told me, “For me to be Guarayo is the first thing…We have our own language, own music, own food, own territory.” Cara Mondori (2005) said that Guarayo culture is “livelihood,” the value of food, how to drink, how to rest, parties, music, how to fish, and also the idea that if someone lacks enough to eat or spend one must share and help him/her. Another young person added artesanía (artisan crafts) to this list. Cara Mondori also explained that the problem of deforestation by timber companies is a significant threat to the Guarayo people. Juan Carlos told me that once there was a tradition of working in the chaco, “So, to be Guarayo is that, to work…to have the ability to be well in society.”

To be Guarayo evokes strong feelings of pride. A young person said to me, “I feel proud of this wisdom…I feel very good about it, cool to be Guarayo.” “I feel proud, but also humble” to be Guarayo, said Juan Carlos. Others spoke of their roots. Adrian Cara Mitucáe, a young Urubicheño man who is now studying to be a doctor in Santa Cruz, told me, “For me it’s very important. I have to know where I’m from and who I am…God sent me here [Urubichá], I was born here, so that’s who I am.” Leonardo Yaquirema Urupapoqui (2005), a music student, said that it is important “because Guarayo I was born and Guarayo I grew up.”

It is obvious that to be Guarayo is an essential aspect of the identities of the people of Urubichá and the culture of the town. Many spoke with sadness about the parts of their culture that have already been lost.

Identity as a Musician

To investigate the identities of the musicians I tried to explore the meaning of the music for them. When they spoke about why they like to play classical music and how it has changed their lives, the words often did not come easily, but it was clear that the music was important to them, “The music is life for someone,” Leonardo told me, “…it’s part of God too.”

Many spoke of the feelings in the music. One young person explained to me during an informal conversation, using many hand gestures, that when he plays, “it’s like, like, something endless…I feel, I don’t know, I feel like I’m flying.” Another young person said, “I don’t know, it’s a feeling that [the music] brings me.”

Others spoke of the sound. Dina Martínez Maraza, a violinist, said, “It’s the sound, and the sound comes from nature…That’s why I like the violin’s sound.” A young person explained to me that the reason he began to play music is because he liked the sound of the instrument.

Many of the participants in my interviews told me that they had always wanted to play music since they were children.

Besides these feelings, the sound, and the desire to play since childhood, many spoke of their musical roots and structural changes that had occurred in their lives. But I will save these commentaries for the following section and the section on the effects of the music.

In Urubichá music is recreation, a graduate of and teacher in the Institute, Vidal Uraba Arirepia (2005) told me. Other towns have Internet games and things like that, but in Urubichá the children have music. Of course, music is more important to some than others. However, I observed many of the students practicing enthusiastically every day and playing together outside the classrooms.

Not everybody thinks that the music at the Institute is a good thing. A young man told me that the musicians “don’t stay here to be musicians,” they want to leave to go somewhere else to play, where no one will recognize their Guarayo identity. “They want to be materialistic,” he told me, the music is more “like a business, not like music.” The same youth continued, “The music for me, it’s a beginning…we reclaim ourselves with it, at least we characterize ourselves with it…for us it is a culture, it shouldn’t be a business.” Another person told me that the musicians won’t play in local festivals because they want to be paid, so they leave the town during festivals like Carnaval to play for money: “They leave their town silent, sad.” In Urubichá, the music is also a source of work, which can have effects that parts of the town dislike. Although it seems to me that many of the musicians would not agree with these critiques of the Institute, it’s necessary to recognize all the opinions that exist in Urubichá about the music.

To be Guarayo and a Musician

Classical (Western) music in Urubichá has little in common with the local culture. Although it is something from the outside and was a tool of colonialism, it seems that the musicians of the Institute are now using it as a part of their Guarayo identity. That is not to say that they have abandoned their Guarayo culture; on the contrary, the meaning of the music has been adapted by many Urubicheños to have a significant role in Guarayo identity. It is as if the Urubicheños have conquered Western classical music, according to Arturo Molina. “The Guarayos are warriors,” he told me.

Cluadia Yapurii Alemendaro (2005), a music student, told me that she likes to play the violin because “our ancestors were the first to play music.” It is “a legacy,” said Juan Carlos, because his ancestors were musicians: “Before I didn’t know this because my parents and my grandparents aren’t musicians, but now I know.” Thus, although they are playing classical music, to be musicians in general is a link to their ancestors. “Here in Urubichá it’s always been characterized as a musical town,” said Adrian Cara Mitucáe, but in the years before Ruben came “it was almost lost, there was very little [music].” When the Institute was founded they were in some ways continuing a tradition of music that had almost disappeared.

When a Western system is introduced in an indigenous culture, often the Western system replaces the native knowledge and identities.

The imposition of external systems through development damages cultural as well as natural diversity. The globalization and dominance of Western intellectual epistemology (and scientific and technical knowledge) erases history and cultural distinctiveness.

However, it seems that in the case of Urubichá the introduction of Western classical music has contributed to an increase in Guarayo identity among the musicians. Being a classical musician “makes me proud to be Guarayo, although it’s something from outside, it’s from here [makes a gesture towards his chest],” said Vidal Uraba Arirepia (2005). To be in the Institute “raises our enthusiasm about who we are,” explained Francisco Cara Mitucáe. Adrian, Francisco’s brother, added that when the orchestra travels, the audience knows that the musicians are Guarayo and it makes them feel good about being Guarayo.

Some have strongly criticized the boom of baroque music in the lowlands. Cergio Prudencio is an excellent example. He writes,

Well, now the result is the celebrated exploits [of the]…Chiquitania Indians of the musical practices that paradoxically neutralized their ancestors. To the eyes and ears of a blind and deaf society–the children presented like monkeys, skillful in their ability to learn a language, without questioning its true significance. So it doesn’t help them to understand their own history, and less so to decide how they want to continue doing it. That’s how you colonize someone.

Prudencio is right, it does seem ironic to celebrate a colonial legacy as one’s own culture.

In her book Michelle Bigenho (2002) writes about the construction of authenticity in Bolivian “national” (nacional) music. Of course, classical music is not the same thing as “national” music, but we can still discuss questions of authenticity in Urubichá by applying Bigenho’s analysis. She writes that there are people who criticize others for being inauthentic (in this case, she is speaking of music); she calls these people the “authenticity police.” The “authenticity police” usually are people of relative power who have no right to decide what is authentic. Perhaps we can include Prudencio in this category.

On the other hand, Bigenho explains that today indigenous identity has an exchange value in Bolivia. The construction of indigenous identity can be a tactic to locate one’s self with more social power. For example, the wearing of ponchos when playing “national” music makes the musicians seem more indigenous, more authentic, but it is a strategy. Is it bad to manipulate indigenous identity? I think it depends on the case. For Urubichenos, although they are not playing indigenous music, their indigenous identity is an important aspect of the project. There is certainly some attraction about the music in Urubichá due to the fact that the musicians are indigenous and from a poor town. But this is more the fault of the observer than of the musicians.

next: The Effects of Classical Music

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Molina, 2005.

Aguape Orepocanga, 2005.

Wells and Wirth, 1997: 301.

Cara Mitucáe, Cara Mitucáe, & Martínez Maraza, 2005.

Ibid.

Prudencio, 2002.

Bigenho, 2002: 4.

Bigenho, 2002: 5.

Yaquirema Urapoqui, 2005.

Anonymous 2, 30 November 2005.

Cara Mitucáe, Cara Mitucáe, & Martinez Maraza, 2005.

Anonymous 2, 30 November 2005.

Yaquirema Urapoqui, 2005; Cara Mitucáe, Cara Mitucáe, & Martínez Maraza, 2005; Anonymous 1, 30 November 2005; Anonymous 2, 30 November 2005.

Anonymous 1, 30 November 2005.

Anonymous, 28 November 2005.

Anonymous 1, 30 Novemeber 2005; Anonymous, 2 December 2005; Cara Mondori, 2005; Ibid.

Aguape Orepocanga, 2005; Anonymous 1, 30 November 2005; Uraba Arirepia, 2005; Yapurii Aramendaro, 2005.