72
Time has revealed that this concept, which permeates all dimensions and scales
of the Moqoit life, is key to understanding their experience of inhabiting, especially
with regard to the sky. Its analysis requires abandoning the distinction between
nature and society. In this direction, the present work seeks to explore the particularities of the Moqoit cosmos and its eminently social and political character, based
on the category of señas. It aims to show that a sophisticated experience and conceptualization of the sky, one that does not abide by many of the basic assumptions
of Western science, is possible.
2 The Moqoit
The Moqoit (mocovíes in Spanish)
1
inhabit the Southern Great Chaco region of the
Argentinian Republic. They belong to the Guaycurú linguistic group, as do the Qom
(Tobas),
2
Abipones, Pilagás and Caduveos. These groups must be conceived as part
of the same ‘ethnical chain’ (Braunstein, 2003: 19).
3
From the banks of the Bermejo
river, in the northern area of the Argentine province of Chaco, the Moqoit gradually
moved south during the colonial period. Before the arrival of the criollos, they were
organized into groups of related families who travelled while carrying out hunting
and gathering activities. During the seventeenth century, they incorporated horses
and cattle. With the Urízar expedition, in 1710, the Moqoit shifted the centre of their
area of action to Corrientes and Santa Fe (Argentina). The Jesuits founded missions
such as San Javier (1743) among the Moqoit.
At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century,
the advance of colonizers towards the Chaco region from Santa Fe caused many
Moqoit to return to the south of the current province of Chaco. Both the Moqoit who
remained in Santa Fe and those who moved to Chaco were gradually forced to enter
1 In their own language, (Moqoit la’qaatqa), the term Moqoit refers to the group that is currently
called Mocoví in Spanish. Since colonial times, they have been designated with a wide variety of
names in Spanish-written documents, such as: mbocobí, moncobys, amocobies, mbokobí, mocoit,
mokoilasseek, bocovíes, amokebit, mosobíes, moscovi, mokowitt, mokovit, etc. Today, the members
of this community use both the terms Mocoví and Moqoit to designate themselves, although in
recent years the preference for the term Moqoit has grown, as a form of cultural vindication. For
that reason, we choose the latter to address them here. As it is the most widely used today, the
alphabet of A. Buckwalter’s Vocabulario Mocovi (Buckwalter, 1995) will be used for the transcription of Moqoit terms (see the Appendix). When transcribing Moqoit or Qom/Toba words collected
by other authors, however, we will keep their chosen alphabets.
2 The term with which the members of this group designate themselves in their own language is
Qom. We will use that word when referring to them, but if quoting other works, we will keep the
original term and add Qom in brackets.
3 That is to say, a cluster of ethnical groups with languages and cultures seemingly connected to
each other, comprising a sort of ‘chain’, along which a gradual series of variations occur. This
derives in spatially contiguous groups being relatively similar—for example, speaking mutually
intelligible dialectal variants—while groups that are further apart in the ‘chain’ present significant
differences—for example, they speak mutually unintelligible dialectal variants.
A. M. López
Time has revealed that this concept, which permeates all dimensions and scales
of the Moqoit life, is key to understanding their experience of inhabiting, especially
with regard to the sky. Its analysis requires abandoning the distinction between
nature and society. In this direction, the present work seeks to explore the particularities of the Moqoit cosmos and its eminently social and political character, based
on the category of señas. It aims to show that a sophisticated experience and conceptualization of the sky, one that does not abide by many of the basic assumptions
of Western science, is possible.
2 The Moqoit
The Moqoit (mocovíes in Spanish)
1
inhabit the Southern Great Chaco region of the
Argentinian Republic. They belong to the Guaycurú linguistic group, as do the Qom
(Tobas),
2
Abipones, Pilagás and Caduveos. These groups must be conceived as part
of the same ‘ethnical chain’ (Braunstein, 2003: 19).
3
From the banks of the Bermejo
river, in the northern area of the Argentine province of Chaco, the Moqoit gradually
moved south during the colonial period. Before the arrival of the criollos, they were
organized into groups of related families who travelled while carrying out hunting
and gathering activities. During the seventeenth century, they incorporated horses
and cattle. With the Urízar expedition, in 1710, the Moqoit shifted the centre of their
area of action to Corrientes and Santa Fe (Argentina). The Jesuits founded missions
such as San Javier (1743) among the Moqoit.
At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century,
the advance of colonizers towards the Chaco region from Santa Fe caused many
Moqoit to return to the south of the current province of Chaco. Both the Moqoit who
remained in Santa Fe and those who moved to Chaco were gradually forced to enter
1 In their own language, (Moqoit la’qaatqa), the term Moqoit refers to the group that is currently
called Mocoví in Spanish. Since colonial times, they have been designated with a wide variety of
names in Spanish-written documents, such as: mbocobí, moncobys, amocobies, mbokobí, mocoit,
mokoilasseek, bocovíes, amokebit, mosobíes, moscovi, mokowitt, mokovit, etc. Today, the members
of this community use both the terms Mocoví and Moqoit to designate themselves, although in
recent years the preference for the term Moqoit has grown, as a form of cultural vindication. For
that reason, we choose the latter to address them here. As it is the most widely used today, the
alphabet of A. Buckwalter’s Vocabulario Mocovi (Buckwalter, 1995) will be used for the transcription of Moqoit terms (see the Appendix). When transcribing Moqoit or Qom/Toba words collected
by other authors, however, we will keep their chosen alphabets.
2 The term with which the members of this group designate themselves in their own language is
Qom. We will use that word when referring to them, but if quoting other works, we will keep the
original term and add Qom in brackets.
3 That is to say, a cluster of ethnical groups with languages and cultures seemingly connected to
each other, comprising a sort of ‘chain’, along which a gradual series of variations occur. This
derives in spatially contiguous groups being relatively similar—for example, speaking mutually
intelligible dialectal variants—while groups that are further apart in the ‘chain’ present significant
differences—for example, they speak mutually unintelligible dialectal variants.
A. M. López