Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
had been prepared jointly with the Peruvians. The first was a macro vision of territori-
al arrangements and settlement. The next was an inverted map of the Upper Purús that
charted the headwaters and the
varadouros
—interfluvial shortcuts to the Ucayali basin.
This wasaclassic military “lying map,” butdaCunha hadmuch tosayabout the ideolo-
gical and political significance of the
varadouros
in the way they knit together the land-
scape. The third was a sketched map of the novel property regime, the rubber trail or
es-
trada
,thebasicproductionunitoftherubberestate.Thehand-drawnmapfilledinempty
spaces away from the banks of the river and onto the uplands under the forest canopy.
With its micro-scale description of demarcation, it revealed how a new property insti-
tution was unfolding, and it disclosed, through da Cunha's commentary, the deplorable
labor relations within, as the converging circuits of the
estradas
inscribed latex's entry
intoglobalcommodities exchanges.Themapsofthe
estradas
canalsobereadinamore
Foucauldian manner, as means through which labor was disciplined through the spatial
organization of production. Da Cunha used the map as a diagram of and a metaphor for
the oppressive peonage regime that was quite common on the Purús.
These maps are illuminating as cultural texts because the explicit “Euclidean” com-
mentary that goes with them permits us to understand and deconstruct their politics and
implications. The three maps can be seen as complements of each other at different
scales, as having legal sway, and as summarizing the mechanisms of territorial incor-
poration in international, national, and institutional terms. These maps were deployed to
show to Peru the Brazilian nature of institutions and settlements. They also showed the
Brazilianness of Amazonia to Brazil.
From the Lands of the Amazons . . .
The1705mapofRoyalFrenchcartographerGuillaumeLisleplacedthe“litigiouszone”
squarely in the “Pays de Amazons.” This land of warrior women was undergoing rigor-
ousmappingexercisesattheendofthenineteenthcentury,astheUpperAmazonnations
partitioned the mission claims and rubber lands among themselves. The fact that the
formal map for the negotiation was jointly produced by a Peruvian-Brazilian commis-
sion gave special luster and legitimacy to what was meant as a “nonpartisan” document.
On December 16, 1905, da Cunha and Buenaño signed their approval in Manaus. Each
country provided its own contextual material to the collective map, structuring the way
thatthepoliticsofthemapwouldberead.Whilethecharthadtheauthorityofascientif-
ic document—that is, the measurements of where “things” in the landscape were were
largely correct and produced through the accepted scientific procedures of the day—it
was an exercise that was permeated with subtexts. The Peruvian document contained
no additional information about the map other than its coordinates but published as the
“framing”materialsanextensivedossierofthebureaucraticexchangesaswellashostile
Search WWH ::
Custom Search