Jivaroan peoples

*This article has been marked by* The Jungle Cruise Wiki *as containing offensive or otherwise sensitive subject matter. Reader discretion is advised.*

## Background information

### Attractions

Adventure Trading Company
Jingle Cruise
Jungle Cruise (attraction)
Jungle Cruise: Wildlife Expeditions
Skipper Canteen
Trader Sam's

## Group information

### Headquarters

Headwaters of the Marañon River, Amazon rainforest

**The Jivaroan** or **Jivaro peoples** are real-world Indigenous peoples native predominately to the Marañón River of the Amazon and who are dispersed in what is now northern Peru and eastern Ecuador. They are composed of multiple different groups including but limited to the **Shuar, Achuar, Aguaruna** and **Humabisa peoples**.

## Description

### Culture

#### Ayahuasca

Ayahuasca is a ceremony not limited to the Jivaro but which is practiced in different forms throughout the Amazon. In Jivaro practice, it is performed to protect someone from the witchcraft of malevolent shaman while also healing their spirits. This ceremony has Jivaroan shaman using a psychoactive brew as a spiritual medicine.

#### Religion

The Jivaro are polytheistic, having a variety of deities/spirits tied to different creation stories. These deities are often tied to nature and the natural world. These deities are often affiliated with stories of them doing battle. Another notable spirit is the *Arutam*, a protector from injury, disease, and death. On the opposite side of this, illness and death are affiliated with evil shaman performing witchcraft.

#### Shrunken heads

Shrunken Heads (known to the Jivaro as tsantsa or tzantza) are the skins of human heads, shrunken and preserved via heating around wooden balls. These heads are often traditionally decorated with beads and knots. Shrunken Heads traditionally signify the bound soul of a vengeful enemy or *muisak* though European colonists would appropriate them as exotic trophies. Certain Jivoroan peoples such as the Shuar and *Achuar* had ceremonial feasts thrown following a head-shrinking.

Shrunken Heads are created via skinning an enemy's head and wrapping said pelt around a wooden ball. The remains also have red seeds placed under their nostrils, have their mouths and eyes sewn shut, and have their lips sealed with three palm pins. The heads are subsequently boiled with herbs to tan and shrink the flesh before being removed and rubbed with ash to prevent the head's spirit from leaving. While drying, the skin would be moulded to maintain its human features.

### Social-structure

#### Households

Traditionally, Jivaro tribes occupy matrilocally-organized households, meaning households organized via the family of the mother/wife.

#### Jivaro Gardening

Jivaroan societies have a heightened focus on gardening.

## History

### Real-world history

The Jivoroan peoples were Indigenous occupants of what is now known as the Amazon rainforest. They were known as a reclusive and complex who were hostile to outside forces. In the 16th century, the Inca Empire attempted to invade Jivaroan territory with a mission to subjugate its peoples. The Jivaro warriors were able to defeat the Inca armies and keep them out of their territory.

During the Spanish Colonial period, many conquistadors attempted to invade and colonize Jivoroan land. The Jivaro were however effective at fighting off these European invaders and preventing them from creating settlements in their territory. Due to this, conquistadors spread propaganda that they were the least, "Civilized" people conceivable as an excuse to steal their lands, murder and enslave them. Because of this, Jivaro or the slur, "~~Jíbaro~~" would come to mean, "Savage" or, "Dim-witted" in colonial Spanish usage.

In the 1910s, Jivaro tribes were pressured by European colonists into trading shrunken-heads which they saw as exotic souvenirs. Because of this, many Indigenous peoples took to faking the heads with animal leather while some others would grave-rob or murder for heads to trade. The European stereotype of, "Headhunting" would partly stem from this, portraying them as actively seeking shrunken head inventory as opposed to it being a religious process connected to battle.

## Jungle Cruise connections

In respects to the *Jungle Cruise*, they have a long history of being the basis for/subjects of stereotypes created by contributors, portraying them as cannibals, thieves, opportunistic criminals, and murderous headhunters. Many of these stereotypes were greatly exaggerated and embellished by European myths (E.G. shrunken heads, blow-darts, headhunting) while others were outright fabricated and based on broader tropes (E.G. thievery, tribal masks and cannibalism).

### Jungle Cruise

The Jungle Cruise has a long history of featuring stereotypical depictions of South American peoples, predominately inspired by stereotypes of the Jivaro peoples. To date, this has included:

* Trader Sam, a dark-skinned South American Indigenous character from Disneyland's Jungle Cruise who was designed by artist/actor Sam McKim. Sam was originally depicted in stereotyped garb selling shrunken-heads from an outpost along the Amazon river. Skippers would also often tell jokes about Sam being a murderous cannibal. For a time, Sam was given an *African* inspired tribal mask with sharp teeth.
* Chief Nah-mee was the counterpart to Trader Sam who was designed by animator Marc Davis for the Magic Kingdom's Jungle Cruise. Like Sam, he was a shrunken-head salesman often asserted to be a murderous cannibal. Unlike Sam who looked like a relatively normal person, Nah-mee was designed as a caricature complete with tribal makeup, a dim-witted expression playing into the Spanish, "~~Jíbaro~~" stereotype, and a top-hat with an umbrella as a form of irony in his, "Savage" portrayal.
* A removed map in the Amazon River Base had illustrations of Indigenous peoples of the Amazon for, "Amazonian River Fantasy" tours. The phrasing of, "Kings and Golden Idols" on the map seemed to reference the Fertility Idol from *Raiders of the Lost Ark* (1981) which contained similar villified South American indigenous peoples via the Hovitos tribe. The Indigenous peoples were removed from this artwork during a 2021 refurbishment.
* In 2021, the head-salesmen were removed from the American Jungle Cruises and replaced by a scene scripted by imagineer Kevin Lively. Said scene had Sam running a gift-shop in the Amazon rainforest where he sold off items stolen from guests from the Jungle Navigation Company's lost & found, portraying Sam as a greedy and conniving criminal.

#### Jingle Cruise

During the Walt Disney World version of this overlay, Chief Nah-mee appeared dressed as Santa Claus offering shrunken heads as potential Christmas gifts.

#### Jungle Cruise: Wildlife Expeditions

Chief Nah-mee continues to appear in this Tokyo version of the attraction. Rather than trading heads or stolen property, he trades enchanted medallions and fruits. His caricature design however remains the same.

#### Jungle River Cruise

No variation of Trader Sam is present in this version of the attraction (though Sam's pet elephant Ellie does make an appearance in his stead). The Umbala tribe of North Africa however is shown using blowguns, a form of weaponry not traditionally used by any documented African tribe but which is often affiliated with the Jivaro.

### Trader Sam's

These bars were based around the character of Trader Sam. Because of this, many of the harmful stereotypes identified with the character were perpetuated in the bars. Amongst these were a shrunken head motif and various references to Trader Sam and his family (represented by shrunken-heads) being cannibalistic. Many of these references were removed in 2021. The bars also revealed Sam to be a magic-user and possibly immortal, an adaptation of the, "Magical Native American" trope which has been criticized for being a minority-token trope that ostracizes Indigenous peoples, exploits Indigenous people as, "Exotic", and trivializes Indigenous spiritualism as Western perceptions of occultism and magic.

### Other connections

#### Adventure Trading Company

In this event, the Daily Gnus newspaper referenced Trader Sam being a cannibal.

#### Bengal Barbecue

The character of Shrunken Ned is the animate shrunken-head of a militarized British colonist.

#### Skipper Canteen

The book, "Friends for Dinner" by Trader Sam references Sam being stereotyped as a cannibal while the book, "Top Hats and Umbrellas" referenced the over-the-top caricature design of Chief Nah-mee. In the mess hall's *Lost & Unfound* is a pith helmet with a blowdart lodged in it, seemingly referencing the affiliation with the Jivaro and blow-darts along with their animosity to white colonists.

## Trivia

* Some of the racist depictions of the Jivaro in the Jungle Cruise might be influenced by the character of Queequeg from Herman Melville's Moby Dick. While a Pacific Islander, Queequeg was a cannibalistic shrunken-head salesman with facial tattoos and who is often portrayed as wearing a top-hat.
* The caricature of Chief Nah-mee is very similar to the stereotypes of North American Indigenous peoples created by Marc Davis for the film Peter Pan (1953). In this film, one of the Indigenous warriors kidnaps the Lost Boys and steals John Darling's top-hat and umbrella.
* Some of the characterizations of the Jivaro are referenced in the Jungle Cruise film, being represented by the Puka Michuna tribe of the Amazon.

## See also

* *List of Racist Elements in the Jungle Cruise*

## References

1. ↑ https://www.easywdw.com/easy/blog/disneys-magic-kingdom-late-morning-adventureland-touring-with-jungle-cruise-pirates-and-crowds/
2. ↑ https://wdwnt.com/2021/08/photos-jungle-cruise-sign-updated-once-again-movie-props-and-amazon-river-sign-added-to-queue-at-magic-kingdom/
3. ↑ https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicalNativeAmerican