Ceramic Production Technology among the Asurini of Xingu: Technical choices, transformations and enchantment

Abstract Several studies in the anthropology of techniques have emphasized that beyond their material and pragmatic aspects, technologies are social constructs that produce meanings. Moreover, technical processes mediate relations between persons (human and nonhuman) and things, as a mode of transformative and symbolic action for the (re)creation of the world. In this article my intention is to present an ethnographic description of the ceramic production technology of the Asurini do Xingu to show the intertwining of the technical choices with the principles and social, aesthetic and cosmological perceptions of this people about the objects, and materials, and their transformations.

摘要 多项技术人类学研究均强调，技术不仅具备物质与实用属性，更是承载意义的社会建构。此外，技术过程作为人类与非人类行动者及事物之间关系的中介，是实现世界（再）创造的转化性与符号性行动模式。本文旨在对兴古河阿苏里尼人（Asurini do Xingu）的制陶技术展开民族志描述，以此揭示技术选择与该族群针对器物、材料及其转化过程所持有的原则、社会认知、审美观念与宇宙观之间的内在交织关系。