SOUTH AMERICAN NOMAD

Distribution of aboriginal South American and circum-Caribbean cultural groups. indigenous inhabitants of South America living as nomadic hunters, gatherers, and fishers. In the past, South American nomads could be found from Cape Horn to the Orinoco River in northern South America. The most variable groups were found in the southern half of the continent, occupying a variety of habitats and exploiting differing resources. With the technology known to them, food production was low, the population sparse, the social organization simple. Constant movement within prescribed territories prevented the establishment of large permanent villages or the accumulation of material wealth. Additional reading Kalervo Oberg, The Terena and Caduveo of Southern Mato Grosso, Brazil (1949, reprinted 1980), is a Smithsonian Institution monograph that includes an account of the Caduveo, a sub-tribe of the once-powerful Mbay, while his Indian Tribes of Northern Mato Grosso, Brazil (1953, reprinted 1979), includes a short account of the Nambikwara. Allan R. Holmberg, Nomads of the Long Bow: The Siriono of Eastern Bolivia (1950, reissued 1985), is a useful study of these people, a good example of the forest nomads; it may be supplemented by Allyn MacLean Stearman, No Longer Nomads: The Sirion Revisited (1987). Kalervo Oberg The Editors of the Encyclopdia Britannica