Yawanawa

The Yawanawa people’s first contact with the non-indigenous world happened around the 19th century. It was an intense period of many conflicts with the rubber barons and missionaries who invaded their lands and tried to forbid the Yawanawa language, culture, and spirituality. In the 1980s, chief Biraci Nixiwaka Brazil led his people in the fight for the recognition of their native territories, and the Yawanawa became the first indigenous people to obtain the official rights to their lands in the state of Acre.

The Yawanawa have since then reclaimed their sacred medicines, rituals, song and dance, festivals, games, traditional body painting and adornment, artwork, and food, in a profound journey of cultural revival.

Isku Kua, representing the Yawanawa youth, the son of Chief Nixiwaka Biraci Brasil, inspires, paves the way, and guides the new generation of his people, taking the force of the legacy of his ancestors around the world. Leading the present and the future of the Yawanawa people, Isku is an example for young leaders of all indigenous nations, demonstrating the value of his own roots and the importance of cultivating ancestral wisdom with solidity and dignity, as the best alternative for the indigenous youth in the world. Isku Kua brings a breath of hope to this new dawn of humanity, weaving a dialogue between the essence of Yawanawa ancestors and the new time.