Human Adaptive Strategies in Amazonian Blackwater Ecosystems

Abstract

Blackwater ecosystems of Amazonia represent extreme nutrient‐poor conditions that differ from those found in other regions of the Amazon. The tendency to contrast mainly the floodplain (várzea) and the upland forests (terra firme) has made it possible to overlook significant differences present within the Amazonian terra firme. These differences can be important in understanding human adaptation, particularly at the extremes of the nutrient‐poorl‐rich gradient. Human populations inhabiting blackwater areas have adjusted to the low productivity of the environment through complex forms of exchange and subsistence specialization, inherited and hierarchical control over the more productive fisheries, segmentary lineage organization, very small settlements at considerable distances from each other, and dependence on bitter manioc for the bulk of their calories. Analytical recognition of ecosystem heterogeneity in Amazonia is likely to lead to reinterpretations of several human/environment processes that have interested anthropologists, such as the protein debate and the role of environmental characteristics on the development of culture.

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