Travelling Amazons. The travellers and the Reflection about the Amazon in the Last One-Hundred Years

Abstract

In the 21st century, even with all the modern technology and means of communication, our vision regarding the Amazon, its peoples and communities remains, to a large extent, similar to that of the 19th century traveler – who referred to it as Terra Incognita, wild space, exotic forest, void, infinite riches of El Dorado, green inferno – reflecting the Eurocentric myth of the Amazon-spectacle. Not even the end of the rubber boom sufficed to awaken a profound reflection on the region, neither by Amazonians (local residents from the nine countries within the Amazon biome) nor by Brazilians at large, particularly the former, who live the consequences of this fact. Nonetheless, in the last hundred years a few travelers, individually or in groups, have broadened our view, favoring a wider discussion on the Amazon and its intricacies, with a new, less prejudiced, more gentle and generous perspective. This article visits the textual and iconographic production (including new technologies) of some of these thinkers who have traveled the Brazilian Amazon, in order to understand their legacy; and presents paths to this much needed reflection on the Amazon, by its own inhabitants, Brazilians and the contemporary civilization at large, so that current generations have a more responsible view of the Amazon.