Information collected by UNICEF

Data on the Kadiwéu language

Alternative names: Kaduveo, Caduveo, Kadivéu, Kadiveo, Mbaya, Caduceo, Ejiwajigi, Goniwoladi ejiwajegi.

The name “Kadiwéu” (with its many spellings) is the one most frequently used, and is probably of Tupi origin. “Ejiwajigi” corresponds to the auto-ethnonym, and “Goniwoladi ejiwajegi” means “our Kadiwéu language”.

Main dialects: There are two main variants of Kadiwéu, in which the way of speaking of men and women differs. These two variants can be identified phonologically. For example, to address another man, a man would use “goniwtagodi”, whereas a woman would use “goniwaagodi”.

Classification: Guaycuruan family, Mbaya branch.

Kadiwéu is a descendant of the Mbaya language, and is its last representative. Kadiwéu is the Guaicuruan family’s only living language not to belong to its southern branch, which contains Pilagá, Toba and Mocoví.

Where it is spoken: Brazil, in the southern state of Mato Grosso do Sul. Kadiwéu Indigenous Territory, in the municipality of Porto Murtinho.

Situated in the Pantanal (the Brazilian part of the Gran Chaco), the natural borders of Kadiwéu territory are formed to the west by the Paraguay River and the Nabileque River, to the east by the Serra da Bodoquena National Park, to the north by the Neutaka River, and to the south by the Aquidavao River.

Bodoquena is the main village of the Indigenous Territory, where three other villages can also be found: Campina, Tomazia and Sao Joao. Sao Joao is mainly inhabited by the Terena and Guana/Kinikinau ethnic groups.

Kadiwéu is the only Guaicuruan language spoken east of the Paraguay River. The other Guaicuruan languages are spoken in the Argentinian and Paraguayan parts of the Gran Chaco.

Number of speakers: the Kadiwéu population stands at 1,629, according to FUNASA (2006). However, this figure probably comprises the entire population of the Kadiwéu Indigenous Territory, which means that it could include Terena and Guana/Kinikinau communities living there too. According to Linguamón, the Kadiwéu population itself is about 1,000.

There are no figures available on the number of speakers, but according to Pechincha (1999), the language is spoken by the whole of the Kadiwéu population, with a significant rate of monolingualism among women and the elderly. The non-Kadiwéu population living in the Kadiwéu Indigenous Territory have a partial knowledge (that is to say at least passive) of the language.

Status of the language: No official status

Education: According to Linguamón, it is indigenous teachers who take responsibility for primary education in villages.

Vitality and transmission: Kadiwéu is an endangered language according to the criteria of UNESCO.

Even if it seems that the language has been well transmitted up to now, younger generations are increasingly bilingual (Kadiwéu/Portuguese). The fact that the Kadiwéu population is small gives cause for concern as to the future of the language in the medium term.

Historical and ethnographical observations

The Kadiwéu are the descendants of the last Mbaya “horde” to have survived, those who were the last to have crossed the Paraguay River to settle on its east bank. In the eighteenth century, signs of a Mbayan horde can be found living on the banks of a river called the “Cadigugi”, all of which leads us to believe that this horde are the ancestors of the Kadiwéu people of today. The last surviving Mbaya horde could be found in the middle of the nineteenth century.

Known as “índios cavaleiros” (“horsemen Indians”), they adopted the horse and integrated it into their way of life as soon as it appeared in South America, having been brought over by the Conquistadors. They had large herds of them.

The Mbaya were a warrior people, whose survival was dependent on raids carried out on neighbouring populations, particularly Arawak populations like the Chamacoco or the Terena. They were organised in a hierarchical society composed of social classes ranging from “nobility” at one end to “captives” at the other. The “captives” played a central role in society, particularly female captives who were used for reproductive purposes. Mbaya women only rarely gave birth, and often only had one child during their lifetime. They dedicated themselves to body and face painting, and their complex and elaborate designs made Kadiwéu culture famous. Claude Lévi-Strauss reflected on the richness of the geometric elements of these paintings and devoted a chapter of his book Tristes tropiques (available in English as A World on the Wane) (1955) to the Kadiwéu (who he calls Caduvéo). He considered these geometric elements to be characteristic of hierarchical societies. These paintings were, in effect, the domain of the “nobles”, considered to be the “true Kadiwéu”.

The hierarchical distinction between the Kadiwéu (nobles) and the captives remains in Kadiwéu society to this day, particularly in their relations with the Terena, and the Guana/Kinikinau who live in the Kadiwéu Indigenous Territory.

The Kadiwéu fought alongside the Brazilians during the Paraguayan War (1865-70) and take great pride in their military exploits during this period.

They consider recognition of their territory as just reward for their services during this war. In fact, it was one of the first territories to have been allocated to an indigenous community by the Brazilian state.

Despite everything, definition and allocation of this territory took time, and was not without conflict with the farmers who had settled there. The current borders of the territory date from 1981, a period that was marked by violent disputes with neighbouring inhabitants or those living on land falling within the frontiers of the new territory. A Kadiwéu village, Xatêlodo, found itself outside the borders of the new Indigenous Territory.

For more information on the Kadiwéu people, please consult the pages devoted to them on the excellent website Povos Indígenas no Brasil (in English and Portuguese), as well as, of course, Tristes tropiques by Claude Levi-Strauss.

Sources

De Castro Alves, Flávia (2010). Brasil no Amazónico. In « Atlas sociolingüístico de pueblos indígenas en América Latina », UNICEF. Tome 1, pp 265-280.

Fabre, Alain. 2005. Diccionario etnolingüístico y guía bibliográfica de los pueblos indígenas sudamericanos. Available online [18/05/2011]

Online sources

Information collected by UNICEF on Kadiwéu [18/05/2011]

Pages devoted to the Kadiweu people on the Povos Indígenas no Brasil website [18/05/2011]

Page devoted to Kadiweu on the Linguamón website [18/05/2011]

Further bibliography

Griffiths, Glyn. 2002. Dicionário da língua Kadiwéu. Kadiwéu-Português, Português-Kadiwéu. Cuiabá, MT: Summer Institute of Linguistics.

Lévi-Strauss, C.1955. Tristes Tropiques, Paris, Plomb.

Ribeiro, D. 1948. Sistema familial kaduéu. Revista do Museu Paulista, 2: 175-192.

Ribeiro, D. 1950. Kadiwéu: Ensaios etnológicos sobre o saber, o azar e a beleza. Petrópolis: Vozes.

Sandalo, F. 1995. A Grammar of Kadiwéu. Ph.D. diss., University of Pittsburgh.

Soares Pechincha, M.T. 1999. Kadiweu

Please see the Atlas sociolingüístico de pueblos indígenas en América Latina and Fabre (2005) for a more complete reading list