Notes on the Bagual: Cattle Raising, Hunting and Conservation in the Brazilian Pantanal

Abstract

SummaryPantaneiro 2 cattle have many facets. Firstly, they are the object or the product of the main economic activity of the region; secondly, they are a key element in the ecological dynamics of the flood plains of the Pantanal;and finally, they are the subject of unique cultural practices and experiences. The articulation of these three modes of existence is discussed in this article, based on an ethnography carried out on farms in the southern Pantanal region. The proposal is to reflect on the Pantanal concept of bagual and the way it relates to the dichotomies of tame and feral, traditional and modern.Keywords: ethnoecology; multispecies; Pantanal; animal husbandry; bagual. Notas sobre o bagual:pecuária, caça e conservação no Pantanal brasileiro ResumoO gado pantaneiro é múltiplo. Em primeiro lugar, ele é o objeto ou o produto da principal atividade econômica regional; em segundo, é um elemento chave na dinâmica ecológica das planícies inundáveis doPantanal; e é, por fim, tema de uma série de práticas e experiências culturais singulares. A articulação entre esses três modos de existência é discutida neste artigo a partir de uma etnografia realizada em fazendas situadas na região sul do Pantanal. A proposta é refletir sobre o conceito pantaneiro do bagual em suas articulações com as dicotomias entre o manso e o bravo e entre o tradicional e o moderno.

Of Feral and Obedient Cows

“…The two terms, cimarrón and bagual , continued to circulate in South America for centuries, well beyond the beginning of colonization. Writing about the Pantanal, a Brazilian region located across the Paraguay River, Felipe Süssekind (2016, 141) notes that “the opposition between feral ( bagual ) and tame, as in many other parts of rural Brazil, seems to make more sense … than that between wild and domestic.” All beings, human and non‐human, have the capacity to oscillate throughout their existence between these two states of becoming, neither of which is ever foreclosed. In a similar way, the opposition between local versions of tameness and ferality played a crucial role in shaping ethnic and class boundaries and strategies of domination in the Casado territory.…”

“…Similarly, Süssekind defines bagual cattle in the Pantanal region as beings that know humans but refuse to be tamed. For local people, being bagual is not a permanent state of existence but rather a certain way of relating (or refusing to relate) to humans and their domestication projects, just like taming “is a process in permanent tension with the animal's movement towards becoming bagual ” (Süssekind 2016, 133). The first time I met with her at a café in Asunción, Milda Rivarola, a famous Paraguayan historian, stressed just how deeply this element of refusal had become part of a shared imaginary in Paraguay.…”

“…The señuelo (literally, bait; sinuelo in Portuguese) is a particularly docile and hyper‐domesticated ox trained from a young age to follow the cattlemen's orders and walk straight. In the English language, these cattle tasked with leading their peers to the slaughterhouse are sometimes called “Judas cow” (Süssekind 2016, 131). Their compliant behavior is obtained by separating the calf from his herd at a young age, and by using physical force to teach him to obey orders.…”

Ações de pesquisa e desenvolvimento realizadas por empresa pública de pesquisa agropecuária com povos e comunidades tradicionais no Pantanal Sul-Mato-Grossense

“…Os primeiros eram hábeis na criação e no uso do cavalo (herança atualmente identificada nos vaqueiros e/ou peões) em caçadas e em combates, além de criadores de gado e carneiro, sendo também identificados como um grupo bastante agressivo. A sua atuação boiadeira, associada à dinâmica das águas (cheias e vazantes), é referida como responsável pelas referências ao gado bagual (Mazza et al, 1994;Esselin, 2011;Süssekind, 2016) no Pantanal Sul durante o período de sua ocupação inicial. A bagueleação corresponde à caça do gado bagual nas matas, atividade tradicional no Pantanal (Nogueira, 2002).…”

From food to offspring: engagement between humans and sea turtles in two communities on the north coast of Espírito Santo

“…Even today, as it was for the elder carebeiros, it is more difficult to perform the procedure with the giant turtle, as explained by other carebeiro, working with the Tamar Project, in 2013, in the Comboios Indigenous Territory (IT), where the consumption of sea turtles and their eggs for food remains legal: '… only the giant turtles are more complicated, even some biologist friends of mine can't figure out where she's gone. It's because she lays her eggs very deep, not like other species where it's very shallow…' 12 There is a meeting of agencies here, because, as shown in Felipe Sussekind (2016) in the context of cattle raising in the Pantanal, you need to know how to read the marks left by sea turtles, so you can enter into and participate in the world of these non-human animals, which, like humans, are agents in their own right.…”