New Tribes Mission
The mission in Bisaasi-teri has a style and orientation quite different from the Salesian mission shown in Ocamo is My Town. The New Tribes Mission has been in this region since the early 1950s. Their main goal, the missionary-teacher in the film ex...
Tapir Distribution
The conflict shown in The Ax Fight disrupted the political stability in Mishimishimabowei-teri. Several days after the fight, Moawa, the most prominent headman in the village, killed a tapir and presented it to his brothers-in-law who comprise an im...
Sons of Haji Omar
Haji Omar and his three sons belong to the Lakankhel, a Pashtoon tribal group in northeastern Afghanistan. The film focuses on his family: Haji Omar, the patriarch; Anwar, the eldest, his father's favorite, a pastoralist and expert horseman; Jannat ...
Climbing the Peach Palm
The ingenuity of Yanomamo technology is revealed in the climbing frame used to scale the spiny trunk of the peach palm tree. Here a young man collects the fruit for his in-laws by means of two frames, each constructed of two crisscrossed poles. As h...
A Balinese Trance Seance
Bringing offerings of rice, flowers, and woven coconut leaves, clients visit Jero in her household shrine to determine the cause of their son's death. Jero lights an incense brazier, sprinkles holy water, and recites mantras as preliminaries to tran...
The Feast
Yanomamo feasts are ceremonial, social, economic, and political events. They are occasions for men to adorn their bodies with paint and feathers, to display their strength in dance and ritualized aggression; for trading partnerships to be establishe...
Moonblood: A Yanomamo Creation Myth as Told by Dedeheiwa
In this myth, the Yanomamo account for the creation of human beings and for their ferocity. The myth is told by the shaman Dedeheiwa.
Long ago, when people "like us" lived in a village "over there," Moon lived there too, and ate the souls of childr...
The Medium is the Masseuse: A Balinese Massage
Unlike many spirit mediums, Jero Tapakan practices as a masseuse once every three days, when possession is not auspicious. This film focuses on Jero's treatment of Ida Bagus, a member of the nobility from a neighboring town. Jero has been treating h...
The Ax Fight
The Ax Fight was restored by the National Film Preservation Foundation.
A fight broke out in Mishimishimabowei-teri on the second day of Chagnon and Asch's stay in this village in 1971. The conflict developed between the villagers of Mishimishimabo...