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esteban tapella / argentina
The Ik from Uganda. Portraits a /Resistance Estebanof Tapella Argentina
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Photo ethnography is the art and science of representing and analysing other cultures visually. High on the peak of the mountains between Uganda and Kenya is a tribe of people, as marginalised as brave, facing enormous difficulties to survive: the Ik. This photo-essay is about them, one of the most remote tribes in Africa. Portraits of Resistance is about the struggle of the Ik to maintain their indigenous culture and livelihoods while coping with the rapidly-changing environment around them. Photography: Esteban Tapella Translation and editing: Santiago Tapella Graphic design: Jorge Piccini
The Ik from Uganda. Portraits of a Resistance
In April 2017 I travelled to Uganda driven by the prospect of meeting and documenting the life of the Ik, one of the most enigmatic ethnic groups in East Africa. Formerly a nomadic hunter-gatherer tribe, the Ik, also known derogatively as Teuso, used to move regularly in annual cycles in the area between the Didinga Hills in South Sudan, the Kidepo Valley in Uganda, lake Turkana and the Zingout Hills in Kenya. Far from being erratic and haphazard, the movement of nomadic peoples is purposeful, measured and systematic and allows them to harness local natural resources without using them up. Thus seems to have been the livelihood of the Ik, until external determinants brought this culture’s evolution to a sudden stop. These photographs are my attempt to portray the Ik, their gestures, attitudes, smiles and mistrust. Their faces are extremely fragile and vulnerable, often cradled in adult hands. Their bodies and countenances are shown embroiled in their rivalry with time and suffering, but also intertwined with a calm patience and a profound hope. Through their gaze, their clothing, their rites and their livelihood, I wish to depict what I would like to treasure in my memory forever.
Esteban Tapella / Argentina
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Perhaps due to their geographical isolation, the Ik are one of the most obscure ethnicities on the planet. The independence of Eastern African countries between 1950 and 1960 established new borders, and what once was a vast territory with some degree of freedom of movement was reduced to a small area in Northeast Uganda to which the Ik were confined. The creation of the Kidepo Valley National Park, now a major touristic attraction in the area, entailed the prohibition of hunting within its boundaries. Thus sedentism was imposed on the Ik, who were forced to adopt agriculture in the infertile soil and water-deprived Mount Morungole.
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Esteban Tapella / Argentina
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Little was known of the Ik, even within Uganda, until 1972, when British anthropologist Colin Turnbull published “The Mountain People”, a book as shocking and heartbreaking as it was controversial. In it, Turnbull depicts the Ik as a society with no rituals, affections nor passions. A society in which the idea of sharing was meaningless, self-interest ruled above all, and every person would try to appropriate everything, even at the expense of others. Turnbull states that cooperation, in the rare occasions it took place, was no more than a fortuitous, unreliable and fleeting resource. There were therefore no “irrational deformities”, such as
camaraderie, affection or loyalty, getting in the way of the most ruthless utilitarian thinking. To this anthropologist, among the Ik there was no sign of affection nor trace of social or family life. Similarly, there were no rituals or ceremonies, nor a sense of moral responsibility towards anybody else. With neither family, friendship, hope nor love, the Ik had no choice but to live or die on their own. According to Turnbull, these circumstances led to a system stripped of humanity to arise in Mount Murongole. It was an icy void, a perfect selfishness, in which the Ik had learned to survive in spite of themselves.
Esteban Tapella / Argentina
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The Ik from Uganda. Portraits of a Resistance
As luck would have it, Turnbull’s book reached my hands after I had lived with the Ik. Had it been otherwise, I would probably have backed out of this exploration. What I saw, felt and learned with the Ik differs greatly from what this anthropologist writes about them.
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As I approached the first settlement, making my way up the mountains, I could see men and women working the land, often on steep slopes. In a clear display of their agricultural way of life, some were getting the soil ready while others were already sowing. In Kuanmae, the first community, I was told that agriculture is also reflected on their rituals, on various celebrations connected to sowing and harvest seasons, which make up their main form of calendar and determine their annual cycle. One of such celebrations, Itobe, the feast of the seeds, takes place at the beginning of the year in the form of songs, dances and gatherings among different clans. Later on, in August,
they celebrate the harvest in a festivity known as Migen. Three mountains are visible from Kuanmae: Lotin, Putan and Morungole. Morungole is the sacred mountain and is believed to be where Liriguari, the god of the Ik, resides. Liriguari is a celestial divinity, half man, half woman, who enlightened the different tribes, presenting the Dodos and the Turkana with livestock, for food, and the spear, to kill with. However, the Ik were only given Nacuta, a stick for digging and sowing, and were forbidden to kill. Hence the Ik are thought of as a peaceful group unlike many of their warrior neighbours in Kenia and Sudan.
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Esteban Tapella / Argentina
Communities are organised in small clans or kinships. In each community, round huts, whose colour blends in with the land, house a family. Next to each dwelling, smaller huts serve as granaries. Every settlement has yards in between groups of huts, encircled and traversed by labyrinths of fences and alleyways that protect them from the strong winds that often blow on the mountains.
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Children are considered as such until they have gone through a rite known as Ipeye, which marks their coming of age. The rite consists in extracting both lower central incisors and takes place between the ages of twelve and eighteen. Younger children can be seen with a bell tied to their legs so that they can be found easily.
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Like other ethnic groups in Africa, the Ik have extensive knowledge of the local vegetation. They identify over three hundred species and are aware of the properties of stems, roots, leaves and bark, all of which they use on a daily basis as part of their diet or as medicine. Some of the most common diseases are malaria, tuberculosis, meningitis, parasitic diseases, scabies and diarrhoea, many of which are the consequence of nutritional deficiencies, which are in turn related to the environmental conditions of the area they inhabit.
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Esteban Tapella / Argentina
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During my stay in Mount Morungole I witnessed an ethnicity that lives peacefully on agriculture. Children were very friendly and adults always showed their happiness, both towards me and among one another. With kids as my guides, I walked the labyrinths of each settlement, where I was able to learn of their daily activities such as grinding corn, gathering firewood, carrying water, drying tobacco and making simple tools. We talked and we danced together, I
was respected and appreciated. Not for a moment did I feel I was before a people with no love nor morals. I did not perceive, not in the slightest, what Turnbull claims about the Ik, that they are a people whose social weave came undone and became a group with no laws nor customs and turned to violence, greed, mistrust, insensitivity and lack of solidarity, in short, a dehumanised group.
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Once back, and trying to process this experience, I remembered Georges Didi-Huberman’s work “People Exposed, People as Extras”. “Peoples are always exposed to the risk of disappearing”, the author says, and then asks “What do we do, what do we think in that state of constant threat? How can peoples show themselves without exposing themselves? How can they show themselves as they are and be respected in their own right?” Perhaps this photo-essay can help, at least in part, to bring attention to a people that remains reluctant to disappear, in
spite of so many determining factors. I have tried to document this ethnicity with the utmost respect, without punching below the belt. In this attempt, as it turns out, it is they, men, women and children who look at us and question us. I wish for the life of the Ik that is depicted here to reflect what I saw at any time, a people who asks for and awaits sincere help, and they do so with hope and dignity. I wish for those who kindly agreed to be photographed to start a long and silent dialogue with each of us. I wish their gazes would grip us and never let go.
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The Ik from Uganda. Portraits of a Resistance
Esteban Tapella
Esteban Tapella studied social sciences and human ecology (PhD). He is professor at the National University of San Juan, Argentina, teaching and researching topics like sustainable development and project management. His interest on photography started as a consequence of different field trips and extension services in rural communities. After some years, documentary and ethnographic photography became a necessity and a very important part of his personal and professional development. His photographic work is driven by his restless desire and curiosity about the world and its people. He concentrates on long-term in-depth projects to create frameworks to reflect on the social, cultural and environmental consequences of our globalized
society. Throughout his essays he attempts to generate dialogue and collaboration between subjects and audiences, bringing different world views into confrontation with each other. As a documentary photographer, he likes to take pictures that could tell powerful stories and advocate for social change. During the last ten years he has been doing photography essays on topics like rural livelihoods, land tenure, indigenous knowledge and identity. He usually works to serve NGOs and local organizations that want to drive social change by telling their stories through high quality pictures. Most of his images are grounded in people from developing countries and highlights their livelihoods and stories of human experience.
www.estebantapella.com
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Consulta y envíos de trabajos: bexbariloche@gmail.com BARILOCHE / PATAGONIA / ARGENTINA Abriendo espacios a la fotografía latinoamericana The Ik from Uganda. Portraits of a Resistance