Intercultural learning in co-existence with the Mbyá Guarani

ABSTRACT

This article offers insights into the collaborative development of the documentary Mbyá Arandu: the wisdom of living between two worlds, which explores both traditional learning and the educational practices of the Mbyá Guarani community. The film was created using the insights and perspectives of community leaders and educators who participated in the making of this audiovisual production. This video presentation predominantly takes place in the Mbyá Guarani settlements located in the metropolitan region of Porto Alegre (RS, Brazil). By approaching the understandings of interculturality and conviviality from the Teko Porã (Good Living) Guarani philosophical perspective of in intercultural dialogue, the creators draw links between the experiences shared before and during the documentary’s production, emphasizing the insights gained from these interactions. The ideas conveyed here demonstrate that it is both essential and beneficial to look to the Guarani’s inclusive and diverse cultural practices as a means to enhance and transform Western (white) educational frameworks. The aim of this initiative is to promote inclusiveness and oppose racial discrimination through teaching and humanitarian efforts. In addition, the text points out the critical role of recognizing and honoring the traditional knowledge, practices, and wisdom of indigenous communities, in this case, the Mbyá Guarani people, as a way of repairing the violent colonial efforts at cultural and epistemological erasure.

Keywords:
Mbyá Guarani Education; Indigenous School Education; Interculturality; Conviviality; Teko Porã (Good Living)

RESUMO

O presente artigo apresenta reflexões acerca do processo de construção coletiva do documentário Mbyá Arandu: a sabedoria de viver entre dois mundos, que aborda a educação tradicional e a educação escolar Mbyá Guarani. O documentário foi realizado a partir da fala das próprias lideranças e professores das comunidades envolvidas com a elaboração deste audiovisual que se passa, majoritariamente, nas aldeias Mbyá Guarani situadas na região metropolitana de Porto Alegre (RS, Brasil). Buscando aproximar-se das compreensões de interculturalidade e de convivialidade na perspectiva filosófica guarani do Teko Porã (Bem Viver) em diálogo intercultural, as autoras tecem relações entre os momentos vivenciados nas com-vivências antes e durante as filmagens do documentário, salientando aprendizagens que frutificaram desses encontros. As reflexões aqui tecidas mostram como é possível, necessário e fecundo inspirar-nos na postura convivial e intercultural dos Guarani para revitalizar e ressignificar a educação escolar ocidental (branca), com a intenção pedagógica e humanitária de torná-la mais inclusiva e antirracista. Igualmente, o texto ressalta a importância de reconhecer e valorizar os conhecimentos, metodologias e sabedorias indígenas, neste caso, do povo Mbyá Guarani, como modo de reparação às violentas tentativas coloniais de apagamento cultural e epistemológico.

Palavras-chave:
Educação Mbyá Guarani; Educação Escolar Indígena; Interculturalidade; Convivialidade; Teko Porã (Bem Viver)

Initial considerations

The “art” of interculturality lies in returning to this level of participation and drawing the consequences on the fact that before being protagonists we are participants and that, consequently, we must investigate and think alongside others. What I’ve referred to as a journey with methodologies and epistemologies (if we want to continue using these concepts) that accompany and allow themselves to be accompanied. That is precisely why I have also insisted on this idea that the practice of interculturality, for those of us who are a product of the hegemonic Western academy, presupposes a process of unlearning (Fornet-Betancourt, 2018, p. 176)

When we walk alone, we walk a little, but we don’t go very far... but when we walk together, the path is endless.

(Santiago Franco - Wise man of the people Mbyá Guarani, 2022)

This article details the collective construction process of a documentary that addresses the traditional and formal schooling of the Mbyá Guarani people, Mbyá Arandu: the Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds¹, and considers the intercultural learning opportunities provided by this process. Conceived and directed by the Mbyá Guarani community leaders and teachers who participated in its making, the documentary was built upon their voices. The authors of this text are Caucasian professors. One, a teacher in the state education system, is also a doctoral candidate in Education, conducting research on Mbyá Guarani education. The other professor, who is part of the Postgraduate Program in Education, has been involved for over two decades in research, teaching, and extension study work in indigenous education, and in recent years has broadened her work to include developing methodologies and offering mentorship and advising indigenous researchers at the university.

In this journey of intercultural learning through co-existence with communities of the Mbyá Guarani people, the theoretical and methodological approaches have been deepening as research strives to ground itself in Indigenous philosophies and methodologies. They learned from Indigenous authors, colleagues, teachers, researchers, and advisees. These philosophies and methodologies have been, above all, the result of intercultural learning, and reflect the notion of collective and collaborative construction in the production of knowledge, respect for and recognition of indigenous existences, wisdom, and knowledge. They increasingly emerge as an alternative and complement to modern Western thought, which still has a Eurocentric predominance.

Research within the still predominant Eurocentric, objectivist, white, and male model is representative of and within academia. This writing-focused model places orality in a lesser role. It disregards ambiguities in the name of affirming certainties, which does not allow itself to be inhabited by disorder, which denies contradictions and opposing viewpoints as if they were erroneous positions. Primarily, indigenous thought operates as a feeling-thinking, as it considers the person - researcher - in their entirety, encompassing thought, but also feeling (Menezes; Bergamaschi; Menezes, 2024, p. 185, our translation).

For this recognition to be seen as a form of reparation for original peoples, it is necessary that we, white researchers in academia, place ourselves in the position of speech that belongs to us, as partners in the indigenous cause, highlighting our own authorship, and maintaining a posture of listening and learning. Understanding the racialization embedded in our society’s structure is vital, especially since power positions are mostly occupied by white people, resulting in a glaring inequality between different peoples and cultures, where beings and their knowledge are hierarchized and one type of knowledge is taken as universal, to the detriment of others. The historical pattern of colonization and coloniality, established in the Americas after the European invasion - with its colonialist practices that hierarchize humanity into superiors and inferiors through racial markers - encounters peoples in the American continent with other philosophies of life, of being, and of coexisting with the other. Regarding coloniality, Quijano (2005, p. 231) tells us that,

One of the fundamental axes of this power pattern is the social classification of the world’s population according to the idea of race. This mental construct reflects the basic experience of colonial domination and has since permeated the most important dimensions of world power, including its specific rationality: Eurocentrism. This axis has colonial origins and character, but it has proven to be more enduring and stable than the colonialism in whose matrix it was established. This consequently implies an element of coloniality in the hegemonic power pattern that exists today (our translation).

Yet, this coloniality encounters resistance when attempting to colonize what cannot be colonized: the unique way of being of indigenous peoples. Here, we are specifically talking about the Mbyá Guarani, as they inspire us to develop alternative epistemologies and methodologies.

Conviviality and Collaboration in Documentary Production

Significant initiatives are present within the administrative frameworks of Western school education, where some important initiatives are supported by current legislation regarding Education on Ethnic-Racial Relations. More precisely, we are looking at laws 10.639/2003 and 11.645/2008 - which modified article 26 A of the Law of Guidelines and Bases of National Education (LDB, Law 9.394/1996). Given the pervasive racism observed in our society’s structure, the study of Afro-Brazilian, African, and Indigenous histories and cultures is now a requirement, reflecting its growing importance.

The Sarau das Nações Originárias (Gathering of Indigenous Nations)², was established through a collaboration between the Lutheran University of Brazil (ULBRA, Guaíba Campus, RS) and the 12th Regional Education Coordination (12th CRE)³ stemming from the idea of creating educational environments for learning from indigenous communities. It also had the participation and support of the PEABIRU Research Group: Amerindian Education and Interculturality (CNPq/UFRGS/UNISC). For two days, September 27th and 28th, 2022, the event was dedicated to discussion circles, lectures, exhibitions of photographs by indigenous authors, and an exhibition and sale of handicrafts. All these activities were led by indigenous leaders and elders, teachers, and Mbya Guarani communities from the region. There was also an exhibition of works created by students from indigenous schools within the 12th Regional Education Coordination (CRE).

During the Indigenous Nations’ Gathering, the photographic exhibition Kaingang Ancestral Narratives: Kamé and Kanhrú in Motion at School was also presented, resulting from work carried out by teachers and students from the University of Santa Cruz do Sul (UNISC). There was also a guided screening of the documentary Mbyá Arandu: the Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds, the making of which is the central theme of this text. This document offers a glimpse into the dialogues, audio captures, and village excursions conducted over roughly two months, the period required to complete the documentary. This process fostered significant intercultural understanding through direct interaction with the Guarani communities participating in the audiovisual project.

Filmed in Mbyá Guarani villages, the documentary explores communities with schools integrated into Rio Grande do Sul’s state education system. These areas fall under the 12th Regional Education Coordination (CRE) and are mainly found in municipalities near Porto Alegre, RS, as detailed below. With an anti-racist educational objective, the documentary’s script was crafted to challenge discrimination and prejudice faced by this community, achieving this by showcasing and valuing Mbyá Guarani culture and knowledge, as conveyed by their leaders, elders, wise women, and teachers.

For 22 minutes, the documentary features Guarani individuals expressing their viewpoints and insights regarding both their own education (traditional and ancestral) and school education, as well as the relationship between them. Our focus here is not on analyzing the technical aspects of the filming process, but rather in understanding the willingness for intercultural coexistence and conviviality present among the Guarani actors, which fostered reflections and learning documented in this article. To that end, we rely on the conceptual notions of interculturality and conviviality developed by the philosopher Raúl Fornet-Betancourt, a scholar of intercultural philosophy. Our aim is to explore the theoretical and practical relationships and interconnections that we can establish between interculturality and conviviality.

Therefore, we take conviviality as a path to an expanded intercultural education; that is, the reflections presented here aim to contribute to the emphasis on the value of conviviality as a way of being together in the construction of a dialogical, more egalitarian, more inclusive, and anti-racist education. Therefore, intercultural education must be extended, contrasting with the existing dominant educational framework that still emphasizes personal autonomy, vertical hierarchy, and competitiveness. The values forged during European modernity have led to an educational system that separates teachers from learners, characterized by practices that fuel and are fueled by structural racism, and which are based on a Eurocentric vision and its supposed superiority.

Our contribution to this effort involved documenting and examining the collective experiences that shaped the creation of the documentary Mbyá Arandu: the Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds. As noted earlier, its production took place in 2022 as a joint effort between the 12th Regional Education Coordination (CRE), represented by one of the authors of this article, and the Lutheran University of Brazil, Guaíba Campus, RS, with Peterson Douglas Machado undertaking the roles of cinematographer and producer. This document details the collaborative, almost two-month long process of producing this documentary on indigenous education, where Mbyá Guarani teachers and leaders, as central figures, articulate their views and insights regarding indigenous school ancestral traditional education.

Why does attentively listening to the voices of Indigenous peoples about their conceptions of education help us to think about Western white school education? Why is it important to build a sense of co-existence and togetherness in the making of this documentary, to the detriment of extractive perspectives, in which the researcher presents himself as the subject, and the “other” as the “object”? The words are enclosed in quotation marks to highlight a colonial viewpoint that categorizes specific groups and entities as “other” and as mere objects, based on a hierarchical system positioning Europeans as supposedly superior and colonized peoples as allegedly inferior. The objectification of beings is naturalized in colonial societies in the most diverse forms of oppression (such as patriarchy which objectifies women and, in the racial issue, whiteness which enslaves Black and Indigenous people), in addition to denying and attempting to erase their cultures and epistemologies. Cida Bento (2022) condemns this phenomenon as the pact of whiteness, explaining it as a self-preservation agreement intended to maintain and reinforce Eurocentric assumptions that deny anything that is not a mirror of Europe and, later on, also of the United States. Just like non-white bodies, the diverse knowledge that has constituted this land since time immemorial, produced and reproduced by indigenous peoples (among others), is historically denied and re-denied in academia.

In addition to helping us explore other educational possibilities, Indigenous peoples demonstrate and teach us practices of conviviality and co-existence that have been in effect since the arrival of colonizers to the land we now occupy. This occurred with openness to the other, the logic of not denying differences, but incorporating them, in many cases, into one’s own identity, frequently viewing them as complementary and reciprocal. This understanding is affirmed by the Kaingang intellectual Bruno Ferreira (2020, p. 44): “Dialogue must be constant between cultures, to unveil its mechanisms, functions, and dynamics. This dialogue presupposes reciprocity, a fundamental tool for interculturality”. The forms of learning and collective, community-based education, of strengthening our ancestral connection and of recognizing our dependence on the Earth, lead us to consider and question practices so strongly anchored in individual merit, in the competitive aspect of school experiences, and in the teaching model that repeats and affirms the value of consumer society and capital, as well as our separation from nature, which has led us to the current environmental and humanitarian crisis.

The insights from Guarani teachers and elders motivate us to embrace a horizon of cordiality among peoples, of conviviality and interculturality as we understand it, as reciprocal experience and learning. The Mbyá Guarani people, a group belonging to the Guarani Nation, are concentrated primarily in the southern region of Brazil and in neighboring countries such as Paraguay and Argentina⁴. The Mbyá Guarani are known for diligently preserving their native language, which is almost exclusively spoken within their communities; the Mbyá Guarani maintain a complex and questioning relationship regarding the role and function of schools in their communities, as they represent the presence of the State and the Western colonizing white curricula. Research indicates the Mbyá Guarani’s ambivalent stance toward schooling, of both wanting and not wanting school in their communities, as well as constantly questioning school practices in their environment (Bergamaschi, 2004; 2005).

Thus, interculturality is viewed as a philosophical perspective that challenges the historical record of an imbalanced dynamic, frequently reinforced by educational methods, where white ideologies are deemed superior to those of indigenous peoples. This perspective originates from the equal power dynamics among cultures, embracing the idea that knowledge is horizontally structured and treats indigenous wisdom as an equally valid system of knowing among all existing sciences, forms of knowledge, and methods of generating it. It was this stance that motivated us to listen to the Mbyá Guarani voices throughout this joint journey in producing the documentary.

We began organizing the visits to the villages in August 2022, and they took place between the end of August and mid-September. Villages (aldeias) in the 12th CRE’s jurisdiction with schools received an invitation to join the project, and participation was entirely optional. Of the eight villages invited, two opted not to participate. The villages that participated in the project are: Tekoa Pekuruty (municipality of Eldorado do Sul), Tekoa Yvy’a Poty (municipality of Camaquã), Tekoa Tape Porã (municipality of Guaíba), Tekoa Nhu’u Poty, and Tekoa Yvy Poty (both located in the municipality of Barra do Ribeiro), and Tekoa Cacique Sepé Tiarajú (municipality of Mariana Pimentel). The schools in these communities are named Tekoa - with the exception of one - by choice of the communities, names with profound meanings in the Mbya Guarani cosmologies. Therefore, the following State Indigenous Schools (EEI) participated in the documentary: EEI Pekuruty; EEI Yvy’a Poty; EEI Nhu’u Poty; EEI Yvy Poty; EEI Cacique Sepé Tiarajú and EEI Arasaty, the latter located in Tekoa Tape Porã.

The initial action involved organizing meetings with Márcia Luísa Tomazzoni, an advisor from the Indigenous Education department of the 12th Regional Education Coordination (CRE), and the ULBRA team working on the documentary’s production. The discussion revolved around identifying the central theme, effective strategies for fostering intercultural dialogue, methods to reduce formalities among participants, and approaches rooted in collaboration among all parties, including producers and the communities they visited. Similarly, questions were formulated, merely suggested to teachers, elders, and indigenous leaders as broad questions, and allowed for an exercise of freedom of expression, which resulted in a wide variety of responses. Nevertheless, these questions formed the central focus of the documentary, allowing for a shared understanding regarding issues of schooling, education, and the enhancement of Mbyá Guarani learning. From that point, our fieldwork began with the conviction of sensitive listening and the authorial recording of Mbyá Guarani voices.

Cinematographer Peterson Douglas Machado thoughtfully recorded the footage, which aimed to demonstrate the respectful and friendly way we engaged with community leaders, starting with phone calls to schedule visits so that we could talk and explain our project for the documentary. Thus, the documentary production process in the communities took place in three stages: i) phone calls to arrange dates for the first visit to introduce the documentary ideas and ascertain the agreement of the leadership and the community to participate; ii) the first visit to present the ideas and obtain signatures on the participation agreement, if accepted (leaders from two communities did not agree to participate); iii) the first filming date (and a second date, if more than one filming session was necessary). Our filming schedule varied: in some villages, we were present for two separate single-shift periods daily, whereas in other locations, we dedicated the full day, working two shifts. Arrangements for each situation were made in collaboration with the village, carefully observing the schedules and boundaries established by the leaders and communities, and mindful of their discretion regarding what they chose to present to us in each village visited.

A methodological approach that champions the creation of intercultural projects, in which individuals from different cultures share their lives and biographies, relies on embracing the potential for co-existence and casual conversations about everyday life. This goes beyond the specific objectives of the work, such as simply recording the words of teachers and indigenous leaders, by actively engaging with and experiencing the village landscapes, including children, forests, water, animals, fire, traditional stories, language, and numerous other elements central to Guarani daily existence. Reflecting on the words of Fornet-Betancourt (2007, p. 28): “That’s it, the moment of communicative reflection from biographies is extremely important. Cultures also have their biographies, not just people.” (our translation).

To achieve our goal, we chose not to limit ourselves to just formal inquiries; instead, we shared our personal stories with each individual during our introductions. And so we behave, not only as researchers or producers of a documentary, but as people eager to listen and learn about their stories and knowledge. When we share common projects, there is no longer an “I” and an “other,” but a “we”. Such experiences tend to remove us from the social environments we typically inhabit, particularly within academia or broader Western institutions. In these moments of shared experience, we take on various roles; and although linked to Western colonizing institutions, we find openings to feel ourselves once again in a state of possibility for encountering the other in their humanity, especially when sharing a chimarrão (a traditional South American infused drink), a coffee, or a meal. This also happens in casual conversations, listening to the wind rustling through the leaves, watching the sunset bid us temporary farewell until future encounters. Interculturality is more than just people meeting; it requires sincere involvement in social projects that bridge cultures.

Our concern, in addition to making visible the existence and knowledge of the Mbyá Guarani culture, also aims to grasp conceptual notions that could constitute to an educational Horizon. This framework would help challenge certain values prevalent in the current white Western schooling system, thereby supporting the development of an intercultural education. Fornet-Betancourt (2007, p. 63) asserts that “interculturality must include the revision of cultures, as they are undergoing redefinition. Cultures are transcending their boundaries through exposure to other cultures and are thus enhancing themselves, including in their ethical and moral dimensions” (our translation).

Our methodology highlights the collaborative and intercultural aspects of the entire process, encompassing both the documentary production and the knowledge generation we aim to achieve through it-and, above all, our central concern is the construction and maintenance of conviviality among the actors in these shared experiences. Despite the distinctions between our roles as educator-researcher and filmmaker-producer, it is worth highlighting a passage from the text Una historia colaborativa: retos para el diálogo indígenas-académico (A Collaborative History: Challenges for Indigenous-Academic Dialogue), in which Joanne Rappaport (a researcher affiliated with academia) and Abelardo Ramos Pacho (a researcher from the Nasa people, Colombia) consider:

In cases of collaborations carried out by external experts, the methodology and epistemology of the professional ethnographer must be subordinated to the team. It implies accepting the comparability and equality between different ways of knowing and, especially, that indigenous priorities will conform to the general framework of investigation (Rappaport; Pacho, 2005, p. 49, our translation).

In this experience, we established the initial organizational meetings for the documentary focusing on the protagonism of indigenous people in all aspects: whether through their exclusive presence in audiovisual media, the format and content they wished to present and express, or their decision not to participate in this production. Our inquiries, which stimulated the speeches of the teachers and indigenous leaders, were designed to acknowledge and honor cultural differences. This allowed deep reflections on the ancestral culture of the Guarani, as well as their current perception of the schooling carried out in the villages by the State. Thus, the collaborative approach has an intercultural bias, since a collaborative project between cultures is necessarily characterized by collaboration between them. Here, the goal is to “improve” our white and Western culture by learning from the intercultural and convivial posture of indigenous peoples.

Regarding the conceptual notion of conviviality, Raúl Fornet-Betancourt (2018, p. 173) tells us that

Human life is coexistence. No one can live their life without coexisting. Nevertheless, it is precisely for this reason that coexistence can also be the environment where the lives of those we deem ‘others’ are extinguished or brought to a bare minimum. Knowing this, intercultural philosophy proposes that the challenge lies precisely in converting factual coexistence (the fact of coexistence) into an experience of conviviality. This last point refers to the slow process of achieving an environment of peace and friendship in our social, political, or cultural relations. Only in such an environment can we reframe the historical reality of our conflict-ridden everyday worlds, attempting to transform them into worlds of closeness that balance differences with justice and solidarity (our translation).

Therefore, conviviality surpasses simple coexistence. It’s not merely people routinely gathering, but rather it necessitates conditions that foster an environment of shared living built on trust and a welcoming attitude towards others, thus creating a space of respect, peace, and friendship. According to the author, conviviality serves as the means by which we can reconsider and restore connections, bringing together peoples and cultures with a shared history of mutual oppression.

The Guarani’s intercultural stance within this shared era of co-existence demonstrated their people’s generosity. Despite facing oppression, genocide, and a past marred by extreme violence, they persist in seeking communal life with other cultures, including those educated in Eurocentric ways. Thus, it creates environments of peace and friendship with them, with a willingness to listen to one another, an attitude that we can translate as conviviality. From this viewpoint, conviviality denotes a willingness to co-exist, originating from an emotional understanding of shared presence, and is receptive to sharing experiences, affections, and knowledge. From the perspective of our research, we also adopt a stance of being-together as a methodology of co-existence, which constitutes another vision of what has been academically established as fieldwork (Bergamaschi, 2005). According to the author, being together is an intense form of co-existence, seeking a fairer view of what has been conventionally called “the other”. This co-existence allows an understanding of the Guarani way of life from their time and space, without a priori judgments. As Maffesoli (2001, p. 142) explains, simply being in company with others makes it possible to “identify with them, even if only for a short time, and observe their actions from an internal viewpoint, free from any pre-existing judgmental or a priori assumption”.

In this sense, conviviality is translated by the Guarani’s people’s approach of transitioning between cultures, identifying with and interacting with what is different, embracing other ways of being in the world according to their needs, interests, and affections. Thus, they produce a comprehensive understanding from this being-in-the-world that encompasses an openness to all aspects of life. Such examples include the way Andean indigenous peoples revere the mountains, such as the Krenak people revering Watu-our grandfather-which we call Rio Doce. Other examples are the mythical words of interaction with all elements of nature, the respect for the Earth, their rituals, chants and prayers in which they revere the forces of nature.

Co-existence and conviviality

The first day of filming for the documentary Mbyá Arandu: The Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds was marked by gray, heavy, and rainy weather. Following this, we received a welcome from Artur Souza, the leader of Tekoa Cacique Sepé Tiarajú-a village with a school of the same name-accompanied by his son, Geraldo Souza. Both welcomed us into their home-community. Like all the leaders and families of the Mbyá Guarani communities who received us, they showed a willingness to welcome non-indigenous people. Their houses make up the territory of the village - tekoa - and their welcoming gestures make us feel very close to their daily routines: an existence permeated by elements of fire, sound of birds, and the children’s play. The plans were to film a bit of the village, showing the landscape along the path leading to the school, but the overcast weather made us apprehensive… Would it be possible to film before the storm? Artur and I quickly realized we needed to appeal to Nhanderu Tupã, a Guarani deity, to prevent rain until our filming was complete, thereby showcasing the Mbyá people’s deep reverence for nature’s forces and their sovereignty over us. And everything went well: the outdoor recording was accompanied by thunder, but it didn’t rain and we were able to get inside the school to finish filming.

As the cameraman prepared the lighting equipment for the recording, we observed the school. In an open shed, black tarpaulins had been placed to protect us from the rain and winds that were very present in mid-August. And it was cold, very cold. The recording was made under these conditions, everyone involved displayed a strong desire and commitment to ensure things progressed. The recordings took place under these conditions: Professor Geraldo teaching the children in the Guarani language; the children interacting; Artur, in the corner by the door, carefully observing everything. Recognizing us - after our occasional coffee meet-ups - he responded with a smile; though no words passed between us, there was no indication that speaking aloud was needed.

The rain, thunder, and wind made a big impact on the first day of filming in the villages. The presence of this force of nature, which often unsettles us so much, seems to have brought good luck. It shakes up certainties, shifting thoughts and feelings opens doors and possibilities.

We learned about the realities of indigenous education daily life in our region, including the many demands of leaders and the hardships faced during the coldest part of the year, by interweaving experiences from the comings and goings of the Tekoa (indigenous communities). We also learned about the welcoming and joy of a people who received us with open arms to show us a little of their life in the village and at school. Within the 12th Regional Education Coordination (CRE) area, indigenous schools either occupy structures built and donated by their respective communities for educational purposes, or they use pre-existing old homes located in the communities’ designated territories. None of the eight indigenous schools in this Education Coordination area were built by the State, although this has been a demand of the Mbyá people for years, even decades. There is also a need for secondary education - to date, this Regional Education Center (CRE) only has schools offering primary education, which forces young people who wish to continue their studies to seek schools outside the village, in the city. Nevertheless, we can see the appreciation of the students and teachers for the space they have built, decorated with Guarani symbols, including images, paintings, phrases, and work done in class. The Mbyá community has assumed control of the school, making it intercultural through their direct involvement, their own ways of learning and teaching, the attendance of students and teachers from the community, as well as the use of their native language.

The title Mbyá Arandu for the documentary was chosen from conversations with some of the leaders who explained that the word could be translated as wisdom. We agree that this careful and attentive approach to living on Earth accurately describes the Guarani’s method when transitioning between their Mbyá world and the juruá (non-indigenous) world. Following the colonial invasion, they endured a continuous struggle, intensified by their relocation to areas close to highways and urban centers, which led to increased contact. Yet, even with all the external interferences and the impact of juruá (non-indigenous lifestyles), their indigenous way of life thrives both within and outside the Tekoa community.

While filming in the villages, we discovered a key responsibility the Mbyá community places on the school: their aspirations from school. As João Batista, chief of Yvy’a Poty village, explains, the village school aims to ensure children learn Portuguese fluently, enabling them to counter and evade prejudice from white individuals.

(...) children in the age of 10 still can’t speak Portuguese well. I myself, for example, only learned to speak it after I was 20 years old. After 20 years, when I tried to speak some Portuguese, I struggled a lot because of it. Just imagine children going to the city, to school, and having difficulty speaking, and we face prejudice about that, right? Many people make jokes at school, and because of that, they suffer a lot (Souza, 2022)⁵.

Regarding this need to navigate two worlds: “It is very important to learn Portuguese because the children go to the city to communicate with non-indigenous people, so we teach the children Portuguese as well, along with the Guarani language” (Gomes, 2022). The presence of two distinct worlds, languages, and cultural backgrounds creates abundant opportunities for conflict, yet also for interactions, provided there is a willingness to coexist. This statement by Leandro Gomes, chief of Tekoa Tape Porã, corroborates the statement by Cristiano Dario de Souza, son of Chief João Batista: “within school, children learn about both cultures, how they have to live, since today we have to learn to live in two worlds. As I always say, we must learn about our culture and the culture of non-indigenous people, how to speak Portuguese and speak our language as well” (Souza, 2022).

At Tekoa Yvy Poty, we were welcomed with music, the traditional Mbyá Guarani choir with their singing and dancing, the smiles and hugs of the children, warming us in the winter cold. We took the ethnoecological trail organized by Gerônimo Franco⁶, a Guarani teacher from the community, and were able to experience being around the campfire, really listening to his words as they mixed with the smoke, mist, and the quiet forest. Gerônimo told us about his story and that of his community, how much he persevered despite the countless difficulties in believing that one day they would exchange the roadside for a good place, suitable for living their culture to the fullest. Even though the humanitarian aid for the Yvy Poty community still has a lot of problems to fix, their area has an extensive forest and a stream, which they use for fishing and other needs.

The engaging discourse, encompassing inquiries, responses, and pauses, unveils profound contemplation extending beyond the realm of indigenous scholastic instruction. This reflection primarily underscores the imperative for systemic enhancements to facilitate the establishment of inter-cultural and inter-world dialogue, fostering a framework of coexistence characterized by deference, tranquility, and amity. This is expressed in the words of Chief Artur Souza: “We Guarani are human too and we need to coexist, so they shouldn’t treat us as if we were nothing. We deserve respect too, we have rights too.” Faced with this message, which shows profound wisdom, humanity, and awareness of one’s own rights, we must humble ourselves to learn from the Mbyá Guarani ancestry.

The conviviality of indigenous peoples

The deep spiritual bond and fraternal relationship shared by indigenous communities with all cosmic entities serve as the impetus for our contemplation of convivial principles applicable to intercultural pedagogical frameworks. Consequently, intercultural discourse serves to elucidate the recurrent phenomenon of cultural assimilation, wherein societies, recognizing their inherent limitations upon interaction, endeavor to integrate diverse knowledge systems and perspectives across the cosmic spectrum of existence. Rodolfo Kusch, an Argentinian philosopher specializing in the profound wisdom of Deep America, offers an elucidation concerning the encounter between indigenous populations and colonial entities:

From the conjunction of being and being during the Discovery, comes the phagocytosis, which constitutes the concept resulting from those who explain this negative process of our activity as citizens of supposedly civilized countries. As is natural, all this ultimately leads to a wisdom, as knowledge of life [...] (Kusch, 2009, p. 6, our translation).

Reading to understand the historical and social processes that shaped the biographies of our cultures is a mandatory task. However, interculturality as conviviality between cultures requires sharing moments of life, life stories. It requires that we place ourselves in a situation of honest conversation, sharing food, cultural practices: of co-existing, of being together. As Fornet-Betancourt says: “Consulting or reading texts can help, but it never replaces contextual experience, the direct encounter that narrativity allows” (2007, p. 28, our translation).

What we propose in this work is to learn from the masters of conviviality: the indigenous peoples. These factors offer a basis for approaching a possible way out of the crisis we are experiencing, the climate emergency, the conflicts that dominate our society and our education as a whole. While no culture, including indigenous ones, can be deemed flawless, as perfection doesn’t exist, we can say that the exchange between cultures is extremely important for the improvement of all. Specifically, it is the values ​​of the oppressed culture that provide examples of respect for getting to know others, for recognizing humanity in others, for building trust despite all the historical and current facts that testify against the hegemonic Western culture.

Furthermore, based on Fornet-Betancourt (2018, p. 173):

Engaging with the others, welcoming them in their otherness, and providing them with shelter is always a process that involves listening to the claim to their own life and world that the other’s otherness represents. Therefore, it is imperative to move beyond a purely abstract state of cognitive and concretize it in the proper distribution of historical reality, in a politics of restitution that complements recognition with the return of what has been denied (our translation).

Therefore, we advocate for learning from the Mbyá Guarani, as well as from other indigenous peoples who, unlike Western cultures, live from the perspective of complementarity: they need each other and value difference. The indigenous world teaches the value of difference, considering it a value and not a problem to be denied or erased.

Intercultural learning: conviviality and intercultural education

The work conducted alongside the Mbyá Guarani yielded a crucial lesson: the importance of a collaborative perspective that resulted in exchanges on various topics that can be addressed by researchers and educators alike. It refers to Law No. 11,645/2008, which enforces the inclusion of indigenous history and culture into the curricula of Brazilian schools. According to Fornet-Betancourt (2007, p. 22): “Not everything is taught. The educational system is a decision” (our translation). Approaching indigenous topics with both diligence and depth intrinsically opens up various prospects, such as recognizing the existence of multiple cultures over a singular paradigm, appreciating diversity, respecting values, fundamental rights, and different historical narratives. The perspective of narratives is subject to considerable divergence, depending on the narrator, the relationship between human beings and nature, culture and nature, orality, ancestry, language and meaning, cultural practices, ways of life, the constitution of the Brazilian population and culture, the distribution of power in society based on ethno-social groups, access to and permanence in school education by indigenous peoples, among other factors.

The adoption of a year-round pedagogical engagement with indigenous cultures, rather than their intermittent acknowledgment during a designated April event, is a decision that implies including historically marginalized peoples with their knowledge, philosophies, and life practices. They can teach us about coexistence among all instances of beings in the cosmos, between cultures, and between cultures and nature. Predominantly, these cultures teach us the importance of knowing in order to live, and not just knowing for the sake of knowing.

The transmission of knowledge from indigenous cultures, facilitated by their oral histories and lived experiences, offers pathways for reintegrating with aspects of being that are undermined by the way of being of contemporary capitalist society.

We are currently experiencing a critically difficult period, wherein adversity manifests itself, for example, at the political, social, and economic levels, as well as in the realms of culture and education, and thus influences the levels of ethics and epistemology. This era, reduced and subjected to the chronology of the capital’s calendar and its interests of private accumulation, only knows a present that exhausts itself in the function of giving presence or exhibiting its “market” value. (...) I believe that this is also, and fundamentally, an adversity that is part of who we are, because it has educated us, and educates us, and we educate ourselves to a large extent, towards the appropriation and internalization of the “values” of the dominant society: individualistic autonomy, the privatization of resources, including cognitive ones, competitive combativeness, the intensified pace of existence, and the consequent forgetting of the memories of who we are, etc. From my point of view, it would therefore be self-deception to pretend that this “educational” process has left no trace in our way of being and understanding how we should be human (Fornet-Betancourt, 2018, pp. 167-168, our translation).

Upon recognizing the scarcity of dialogue - which have been worn down and lost in our era - we are reminded, so as not to mirror this reference point, that we must document the moments of extreme violence between cultures and peoples, and even between people of the same culture. We observe this in the routine of (white) schools and the recurring complaints from educators about the lack of conditions to create a healthy teaching-learning environment. In our co-existence with the Mbya Guarani, we can seek other civilizational horizons for the re-establishment of humanitarian principles. What are these values that underpin the scarcity of space for dialogue? It is in the beauty of the conviviality of Teko Porã⁷ that we find our way when we seek answers to a path of healing. This perspective was introduced by Carlos Papá, a Guarani indigenous man who opens the book Arandu Mirim: small wisdoms, saying:

Darkness is responsible for the entire Universe; everything that is created springs from darkness: earth, water, mountains, all of us. From the origins of our ancestry, we continue to preserve our memory, caring for our sacred territory, Nhe’ery, which daily teaches us to live in harmony with all beings. We continue with the children, our prayer leaders, chanting sacred songs to keep the forest alive so that we may continue to have healing plants, nourishing fruits, and the joy that motivates our journey towards Good Living (Quoted by Franco; Ramos; 2023, s/n, our translation).

Good Living is what really shows us how to behave in a friendly way. It’s a type of traditional education for the Mbyá Guarani that doesn’t happen in schools; instead, it is passed down and updated through the generations as elders share their wisdom and advice with the younger folks. Thus, they keep alive a culture and way of being in the world that cannot be colonized, precisely because it exists and re-exists outside of modern Western institutions.

The delicate and fragile fabric of human relations shows, in the history between colonizers and the America´s indigenous peoples, that the latter present us with a different form of civilization, showing who is “civilized”: who is able to build networks of dialogue, collective discussions, movements of resistance and re-existence - other ways of being and living despite interventions and aggression. In Tzvetan Todorov’s work, The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other (1999), we encounter Christopher Columbus’s egocentric and colonizing misunderstandings in several passages. An example of this is seen when he presents himself as a possible interlocutor of a language he completely does not understand; or when he defines a human voice as an “absence” of speech, since he was unable to recognize it as a different language. In other words, he is unable of recognizing difference as a vital characteristic. Todorov notes that several translators were so astonished by Columbus’s perception that they corrected his words, modifying the phrase “so that they may learn to speak,” used by him in his letters to the King of Spain - intended to ‘civilize’ indigenous people within the Kingdom of Spain - to “so that they may learn our language” (Todorov, 1999, p. 36). There was a surprise from other worldviews in the face of this limitation of Columbus and so many other invaders/colonizers in recognizing and accepting difference is evident.

Despite significant misunderstanding, the indigenous peoples tirelessly demonstrate that a path to healing and reconciliation is possible for the deep wound caused by the colonizer, by opening their Tekoa (traditional indigenous communities) to visitors interested in learning about their culture and building an intercultural coexistence.

We reflect on the significant endeavor involved in reviving the memories and origins of our histories when trying to answer the question “who are we?”. It is a vital question for thinking about the values we carry and that carry us on our journeys throughout our limited existence on Earth. As a collective, the question “who are we?” takes on an even more urgent dimension when we find ourselves in irreversible situations of violation of basic human rights, attempts at cultural erasure, violence, or even the complete destruction of others.

Living together with all forms and instances of existence in the cosmos is a foundational element of Teko Porã, the traditional Guarani way of life, the Good Living, within the sacred precepts left by Nhanderu to his sons and daughters, according to the Mbyá. The Guarani’s intercultural ontology, aiming for harmony with others, unveils its worldview, which is grounded in conviviality, primarily by embracing differences. Their openness to the other stems from this original disposition towards conviviality. As Santiago says in the documentary Mbyá Arandu:

The earth was created by Nhanderu: nature, animals, human beings, plants, everything was created by Nhanderu. So we Guarani know, and we teach, we xeramoi (elders, wise ones), our great-grandfathers taught us to have respect because it was created by Nhanderu. (...) With this nature, if we destroy it, if we let destroy it, I think it will be very difficult to recover our lives and our environment, which is mainly our land” (Franco, 2022, our translation).

The philosophy of Teko Porã exemplifies a deep regard for life and the well-being of others, offering a model for reinvigorating our humanitarian principles, which ought to drive intercultural learning in Western white educational settings. Through studying interculturality and conviviality with the Mbyá Guarani, we can sentipensar (feeling-thinking)⁸ an education that no longer knows where it is going, that only serves business models that value market competitiveness and competence, not conviviality.

Santiago’s message is crystal clear:

Let’s respect each other, let’s get to know each other, let’s have love for people: the rich, the poor. We are poor, we don’t have money, but our life is valuable, our mind is knowledge, our vision is very valuable to us. The value that is worth more than money is life, through, nature, which is important (...). Let’s respect each other, embrace our world, embrace our life, and embrace Nhanderu, who always illuminates our lives so that our people may live better, more and more (Franco, 2022, our translation)⁹.

The teaching and invitation to conviviality and interculturality are more than transparent in Santiago’s words; they remind us that our humanitarian values should not reside in things, nor in objects, but in our lives, in our hearts and bodies, in our existence - and inevitable co-existence - within Pachamama. Therefore, this space-time of coexistence must be built as conviviality among us.

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• Support or funding:
  Not applicable.
• Availability of research data:
  All data are available via links and/or references provided in the article.
• How to cite this article:
  BERGAMASCHI, Maria Aparecida; TOMAZZONI, Márcia Luísa Aprendizagens interculturais na com-vivência com os Mbyá. Educar em Revista, Curitiba, v. 42, e98132, 2026. https://doi.org/10.1590/1984-0411.98132-T
• 1
  Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDSQSKEcAB4. Accessed on: Nov. 18, 2024.
• 2
  Sarau das Nações (Nations’ Gathering) is an annual event promoted by the International Relations Office of Ulbra. Specifically, in the 2022 edition, the honored country was Brazil, represented by its indigenous peoples.
• 3
  The Regional Education Coordination Offices (CREs) are part of the Education Secretariat of the State of Rio Grande do Sul (SEDUC/RS). There are thirty coordination offices, each one coordinating school education in a region of the state. In 2022, this management body proposed to bring the theme of indigenous education and cultures to the center of its actions.
• 4
  According to information from the Socio-environmental Institute for Indigenous Peoples in Brazil (Instituto Socioambiental de Povos Indígenas no Brasil): https://www.pib.socioambiental.org/pt/Povo:Guarani_Mbya. Accessed on: Jan. 3, 2025.
• 5
  This is a transcript of a quote from the documentary Mbyá Arandu: the Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds. All highlighted quotes from the documentary presented here include the person’s last name and the year (2022) of production.
• 6
  According to Laura Nelly Mansur Serres’ thesis: “The Yvy Poty Ethnoecological Trail Project, designed and executed by the Tekoa Yvy Poty community, seeks to strengthen the memory of its people and preserve the Guarani Mbya indigenous heritage. It is a living school where they educate themselves. It is also open to visits from non-indigenous people, who seek to contribute to the intercultural education of non-indigenous people” (Serres, 2022, p. 193).
• 7
  Guarani way of being; an expression used by the Guarani to express to non-indigenous people their traditional and ancestral way of Good Living. Cledes Markus, in his doctoral thesis entitled The contributions of the indigenous conception of Good Living to intercultural and decolonial education (As contribuições da concepção indígena do Bem Viver para a educação intercultural e descolonial) (2018, p. 84), tells us that in the final document of the VII Continental Meeting on Indigenous Theology in Pujilí, Ecuador, in 2013, on Good Living, this term appears in the language of the fifty peoples present at the event, and Teko Porã is recorded as the translation of Good Living by the Mbyá Guarani people of Paraguay and Brazil.
• 8
  Sentipensante (feeling-thinking), a notion grasped and disseminated by Orlando Fals Borda (2015) in his work with the indigenous and riverside peoples of Colombia, who consider thinking in the dimension of living itself, that is, as an action of the heart and mind = feeling-thinking.
• 9
  Quote transcribed from the documentary Mbyá Arandu: the Wisdom of Living Between Two Worlds.

• Responsible editor(s) - Editor-in-Chief:
  Angela Scalabrin Coutinho

Data availability

All data are available via links and/or references provided in the article.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  15 May 2026
• Date of issue
  2026

History

• Received
  16 Jan 2025
• Accepted
  19 Feb 2025