Yanomamo Culture

A detailed Summary of Yanomamo Culture


The Yanomamo culture has been virtually unchanged for nearly 2000 years. Trading with the outside world began in the 1950's for the Yanomamo culture bringing diseases and new technology. In a matter of 40 years the population was cut in half. With the trade hammocks, machetes, money, advanced weaponry (guns) have infiltrated and mainstreamed their way into the Yanomamo culture.

Today's Yanomamo culture values strength and dependability in its community. Vengeance is also a key part of the Yanomamo culture. Children are taught from a very young age that, "every blow deserves a counterblow." This is shown in the scene where the child with the stick is "playing" with his father. They also develop a high pain tolerance from a very young age, for example in the movie there was a child of about 2 years old playing with hot wood ashes. Another illustration of this point is the children's facial piercings, many of the children (aged about 10) had numerous bamboo type facial piercings through their


The Yanomamo culture helps to show that nurture is more important than nature in the ever-ongoing opposition. For example, the Yanomamo culture values a high pain tolerance in its societies members. Through the years we are not shown that the tolerance has slowly built itself up naturally, but rather that childhood games are played to teach children how to accept pain.

The Yanomamo culture is in some ways very much like our culture today, sex is spoken of casually, bodily piercings are mainstreamed, bastard children (in the dictionary definition) are accepted, spousal abuse is not accepted and gender stereotyping is quite evident. However, the culture is also very unlike ours today. Yanomamo people are much more giving, they care more for their community as a whole than themselves as individuals. They believe as a community in spirits, they seem to hold a grudge a bit longer than the average American. The ritualized drug use, almost complete self-sufficiency, and community caring really se

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Approximate Word count = 676
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

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