WAI-WAI

Deep in the forests of British Guiana near the Brazilian border and north of the Amazon live a remote tribe of Indians, the Wai-Wais. Nicholas Guppy's recent expedition into this area is meticulously recorded here. Written informally and in an animated style Guppy blends anthropological detail with entertaining personal experience. Unlike most of their neighboring tribes, the Wai-Wais are still free from white influence although the author believes this freedom will be comparatively short lived. Unhampered by alien concepts they pursue a complicated system of values, myths and expression which is authentic and revealing. Free from the neuroses and strains of ""civilized"" societies, theirs is by no means a simple, surface existence and it is on their unique solution to economic, social, sexual, artistic, and psychological problems that the author dwells. Nicholas Guppy's illuminating monograph should be of interest to workers in the field of anthropology as well as to those who would gain a vivid insight into the various forms life can take in an organized society.