Amazon caboclos have been variously described as peasants, forest extractors, backwoodsmen, and descendants of mixed European, Indian, and African ancestry. In nearly all definitions it is acknowledged that the term is pejorative and seldom used when addressing an equal. Many within the subculture do not use it to refer to themselves, while those who do label themselves as such do so under special circumstances. If one accepts that a political/ethical goal of social science - particularly of anthropology - is to understand cultures on an equal basis and to provide as much integrity to them as we do our own, then why do we insist on using the term? This paper examines this quandary by discussing representation and uses of authority in ethnographic writing
Amazon; Cablocos; Ethnographic representation