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"Amazonia" designates the Amazonian world, to be more precise a body of peoples distinguished by a specific culture which anthropologists also call "lowland societies" as opposed to those of the Andine world. Some of the peoples whose objects are shown here live outside the Amazon hydrographic basin. Others do not - or no longer - live in the humid tropical Amazonian forest but in savannah or dry forest ecosystems.
Anthropologists agree that the systems of thought of Amazonian Amerindian populations are characterized by a holistic view of the environment. All natural beings and elements – humans, plants, animals or minerals – possess a spirit or soul. In this animist mode, there is no hierarchy between species. Thus human beings share their status of thinking and acting individuals with most animals but also at times with plants or with a natural phenomenon like the wind. In this context, there is no opposition between nature and culture and shamans play the role of mediators.
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