Labrets: piercing and stretching on the northwest coast and in amazonia

Abstract

This article examines the practice of piercing and stretching the lip in order to accommodate a labret in two regions: the North American Northwest Coast (with historical examples from Tlingit and Haida groups) and lowland South America (utilizing ethnographic writings on Suya and Kayapo communities). Drawing on the recent ‘sensorial turn’ within anthropology, I suggest an approach which goes beyond considerations of the symbolism of body ornaments and analyses how the infliction of pain they involve can be manipulated to serve social ends at a local level. Also discussed is the use of labrets within global ‘mediascapes’ (Appadurai 1996) by Kayapo and Northwest Coast groups in the context of self-representation and the politicization of ‘culture’ (Wright 1998).

This article examines the practice of piercing and stretching the lip in order to accommodate a labret in two regions: the North American Northwest Coast (with historical examples from Tlingit and Haida groups) and lowland South America (utilizing ethnographic writings on Suya and Kayapo communities). Drawing on the recent ‘sensorial turn’ within anthropology, I suggest an approach which goes beyond considerations of the symbolism of body ornaments and analyses how the infliction of pain they involve can be manipulated to serve social ends at a local level. Also discussed is the use of labrets within global ‘mediascapes’ (Appadurai 1996) by Kayapo and Northwest Coast groups in the context of self-representation and the politicization of ‘culture’ (Wright 1998).