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Traditional Kayapó villages are formed by
a circle of houses built around a large cleared plaza.
In the middle of the village there is the men’s house,
where male political associations meet on a daily basis.
This centre is a symbolic place, the origin and heart
of Kayapó social and ritual organization, celebrated
for its complexity. Notably, this spatial and symbolic
structure can also be found among other Gê groups.
The village periphery is constituted by houses
set in a circle, divided in regular fashion and inhabited
by extensive families. This part of the village is associated
above all with domestic activities, the physical development
of the individual and his or her integration into the
kinship groups. When the women are not working in the
swiddens, they collect fruits and firewood or go to
bathe. The rest of the time is spent inside or close
to the house, where they weave, look after their children,
prepare food or simply pass the time with members of
their family. Conceptually, the circle of houses is
women’s territory, essentially directed towards
‘female’ concerns. It involves the domain
of individual relations, marked by affection and avoidance,
as well as relations of reciprocity and mediation. As
a whole, this peripheral zone is associated with alimentary
taboos, the life cycle, kinship and the bonds of formal
friendship.
The Kayapó are monogamic. When a man
marries, he leaves the men’s house to live under
his wife’s roof. Women, for their part, never leave
their maternal residence. Theoretically, a house shelters
various conjugal families: a grandmother and her husband,
along with their daughters and their husbands and children.
When the number of residents becomes too large (40 people
or more), the residential group splits and builds one
or more new houses next to the first one.
The centre of the village is composed of two
parts: the plaza, where most of the public activities
unfold, and the men’s house. The incorporation
of a young boy in the life of the men’s house takes
place through friendship ties that have nothing to do
with kinship ties. Thus, his incorporation in the adult
men’s political groups (the male associations)
is a matter lying outside of kinship, which contrasts
strongly with the relations sustained on the village
periphery. The centre is, then, related to the male
associations and the activities typically reserved to
men – meetings, discourses, and the performance
of public ceremonies and rituals.
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