Dono, debito e territorialità. Per un'ecologia delle relazioni in un "territorio tradizionale" del Brasile.

This article intends to show how the gift, establishing a specific relationality between human and nonhuman world, takes on a fundamental role in defining the territoriality of an Amazonian community of descendants of African slaves. Analysing ethnographically the habit of giving parts of the forest, without expecting something back, the peculiarity of a system of property rights on natural resources will be highlighted, where the communitarian and inalienable dimension of land and the individual possession of vegetation fuses together. In such a territorial model, the gift of the forest represents a form of reciprocal and egalitarian social recognition which establishes the very sense of belonging to the community. On the other hand, the exchange of labour, which represents the foundation of the economic life of the group, based on a form of subsistence agriculture, appears as an expression of a disparity of power that can create a binding condition of debt. Exploring these dynamics, this article offers a contribution to the comprehension of the so called “traditional territories” in Brazil.