The culture of water of Southern Chaco indigenous groups

Abstract

A culture is frequently evaluated by the material production of its members and its explanations. However, the cultural dimension overpasses manufactures to include cosmology and the interpretations on the environment and its resources. Furthermore, it tends to be impossible to separate these three dimensions (material creation, cosmology, environment) as they participate in a social network where the existence of one of them cannot be conceived without the other. The interpretation and management of water for the ethnic groups of the southern Gran Chaco is a clear example that culture can only be studied holistically, for any specific object such as a simple vessel responds to a large universe of beings, conditions and availability which justify its existence.