processes, sexual practices and desires are considered fundamental issues for the understanding of female embodiment. This study builds on the perspective that Kariri-Shoco shamanism is the fundamental locus for approaching and understanding symbolic Kariri-Shoco ethnophysiological reproductive concepts and the experiences women have through sexual difference and practices. Thus, this investigation has approached Kariri-Shoco shamanism as matrix of symbols of embodiment concepts, perceptions, and experiences related to both their concepts of sexual difference and medical practices. The purpose of this qualitative research is to describe and analyze how female embodiment, as gendered embodiment, is intertwined with sexual difference, reproductive physiological processes and shamanism. This provides the possibility to approach how female embodied subjectivity is produced and experienced within the Kariri-Shoco cultural context. In addition, the interrelation between indigenous and non-indigenous medical practices was approached. The plural medical context (indigenous, biomedical, and Afro-Brazilian religious) was considered through Kariri-Shoco shamanic specialistsâ€&#x; perceptions and experiences with cure-healing practices and through experiences that Kariri-Shoco women have with reproductive processes. In Chapter II, historical and ethnographic data about the Kariri-Shoco is presented as a way to describe the research context.
Different official policies
established during colonial history, Kariri-Shoco contemporary history, and an ethnological and anthropological literature review of studies about northeastern Brazilian indigenous peoples (including the Kariri-Shoco) serve as foci. In the first
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