"Before the "Ecologically Noble Savage
Gendered Representations of Amazonia in the Global Media in the 1970s
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4500844 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Sarah Sarzynski (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2021 |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 47-62 |
| Publication date | 2021-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Latin American Perspectives (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0094-582X • E-ISSN: 1552-678X |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0094582x20988694 |
| OpenAlex | W3144504827 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 23 |
An analysis of media representations of the Amazon and indigenous peoples reveals how media producers and filmmakers foregrounded discourses naturalizing gendered and racialized differences that distinguished the Amazon from the West in the 1970s, a decade during which the Brazilian military dictatorship promoted development projects in Amazonia. These representations often sexualized indigenous peoples and the Amazon itself, portraying them as primitive, cannibal savages, animals or part of nature, or victims of exploitation. The "Othering" of the Amazon and Amazonians was further elaborated through a discourse of binary oppositions that portrayed Western white men as explorers and exploiters who dominated the screen, scripts, studies, and development projects even if they were doomed to fail. By relying on a symbolic system of difference, global media coverage and films about Amazonia in the 1970s were complicit in legitimizing authoritarian decrees promoting large-scale development that depicted indigenous peoples and the environment as obstacles. Un análisis de las representaciones mediáticas de la Amazonía y sus pueblos indígenas revela cómo, en la década de 1970, productores y cineastas mediáticos resaltaron discursos que naturalizaron las diferencias de género y racializadas con las que se distinguían a la Amazonía del Occidente en una época durante la cual la dictadura militar brasileña promovió proyectos de desarrollo en la región. Dichas representaciones a menudo sexualizaban a los pueblos indígenas y a la Amazonía misma, retratándolos como primitivos, caníbales salvajes, animales o elementos naturales, o víctimas de explotación. La "otredad" de la Amazonía y los amazónicos se elaboró a través de un discurso de oposiciones binarias que retrataba a los hombres blancos occidentales como exploradores y explotadores que dominaban la pantalla, los guiones, los estudios y los proyectos de desarrollo, incluso si estos estaban condenados al fracaso. Al confiar en un sistema simbólico de diferencia basado en oposiciones binarias y estereotipos, la cobertura mediática global y las películas sobre la Amazonía en la década de 1970 fungieron como cómplices en la legitimación de los tipos de proyectos y políticas llevados a cabo en la región
Amazon rainforest · Art · Authoritarianism · Democracy · Dictatorship · Ethnology · Geography · Humanities · Indigenous · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Ecology · Gender Studies · Law · Media Studies and Communication
Wildlife Films
The white man's Indian
Freaks Talk Back
On Unthinking Eurocentrism
Gender
Yanomami
Environmental Concerns in Contemporary Brazil
The Amazon Land War in the South of Pará
Environmentalism in Popular Culture
Beyond the Ecologically Noble Savage
Entangled Edens
Lovers of Human Flesh
Arrested development or the queerness of savages
Colonial Forestry
Reification and the Human Commodity
The land, the road, and the freedom to move on
Escravos da desigualdade
Consuming Images
The Shifting Middle Ground
The Borders of Sense
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |