O exercício da tutela sobre os povos indígenas: considerações para o entendimento das políticas indigenistas no Brasil contemporâneo

Abstract

The aim of the present text is to provide some elements forthinking about the ways in which the transmission of knowledge, as aconstitutive part of the exercise of State power, occurs. Here, I look at formsthat go beyond those molded or excercized by the school system, whetherthese are conceived of as formal organizations of teaching and learning, orin specific processes of training characteristic of bureaucratic organizations,the guides of which generally consist of written codes. Intending to provokeevocations and reasoning through homologies, I take as the starting pointfor my study, in terms of a historical model, an analysis of tutelage as meansof exercising power. I also engage with what I call “traditions of knowledgein the management of colonial inequality”, looking at how these areemployed in training the cadres of government agencies for direct actionamong indigenous peoples. My empirical focus in this endeavor is thetraining technicians of Brazil’s National Indian Foundations (Funai) receivedin “indigenism” during the decade stretching from 1970-80.