An overview of the presence of the Xokleng in the process of occupation of the region is given, showing that they followed each step the settlers made in their territories. Afterwards, the events of Passo Ruim are analyzed, trying to find out how the indigenous group acting there was related to the expeditions sent in its pursuit, emphasizing its protagonism.
The news of this attack was sent by the sub-chief of police of Rio Negro, Mr. This led the sub-chief to conclude that at the time of the attack they were asleep and had no time to react. There was no sign that there had been any reaction from the man of the troop. They were massacred quickly and with no chance of retaliation. On the 17th, he wrote his report and sent it to the Police Department in Curitiba, which relayed it to the president of the Province on the 19th.
This event was the main subject of conversations, for a long period, in all the parishes, villages and sales of the region along the Estrada da Mata. The trap of polarized history will be avoided, which simplifies relations between indigenous populations and national society, not forgetting that there was a border war in this region, standing out the Xokleng protagonism in the fight for the maintenance of their lives and against the robbery play of their territories.
The theoretical-methodological anchorage that underlies the analysis comes from reflections on the history of indigenous peoples carried out from the North American matrix and started with the Conference of Indigenous History of Columbus Ohio, USA in , and the contributions of historians and anthropologists who put this question on the Brazilian academic agenda from the s. It is not enough to characterize the historical indigenous simply as a victim who has watched passively for his destruction It is important to recover the historical subject who acted according to his reading of the world around him, a reading that is informed both by the cultural codes of his society and by the perception and interpretation of the events that occurred.
Monteiro, , p. They reaffirm common sociocultural characteristics such as: division into clan halves, body paintings identifying these halves, myths of origin related to these halves, reciprocity between halves, exogamy, uxorilocal residence and marriage between cousins, among others. In the watershed of the rivers Preto e Itapocu is the shelter Ruckl, known like graveyard of the botocudos Xokleng.
