E. N. Anderson

The Eye of the Flute: Chumash Traditional History and Ritual as Told by Fernando Librado Kitsepawit to John P. Harrington . Travis Hudson, Thomas Blackburn, Rosario Curletti, and Janice Timbrook, eds. lllustrated by Campbell Grant. Santa Barbara: Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara Bicentennial Historical Series iv. 1977. 130 pp., map, 19 illus., 4 appendices, indexed, clothbound. No price given.

The knowledge systems and practices of Indigenous Peoples and local communities play critical roles in safeguarding the biological and cultural diversity of our planet. Globalization, government policies, capitalism, colonialism, and other rapid social-ecological changes threaten the relationships between Indigenous Peoples and local communities and their environments, thereby challenging the continuity and dynamism of Indigenous and Local Knowledge (ILK). In this article, we contribute to the “World Scientists' Warning to Humanity,” issued by the Alliance of World Scientists, by exploring opportunities for sustaining ILK systems on behalf of the future stewardship of our planet. Our warning raises the alarm about the pervasive and ubiquitous erosion of knowledge and practice and the social and ecological consequences of this erosion. While ILK systems can be adaptable and resilient, the foundations of these knowledge systems are compromised by ongoing suppression, misrepresentation, appropriation, assimilation, disconnection, and destruction of biocultural heritage. Three case studies illustrate these processes and how protecting ILK is central to biocultural conservation. We conclude with 15 recommendations that call for the recognition and support of Indigenous Peoples and local communities and their knowledge systems. Enacting these recommendations will entail a transformative and sustained shift in how ILK systems, their knowledge holders, and their multiple expressions in lands and waters are recognized, affirmed, and valued. We appeal for urgent action to support the efforts of Indigenous Peoples and local communities around the world to maintain their knowledge systems, languages, stewardship rights, ties to lands and waters, and the biocultural integrity of their territories—on which we all depend.

Review of The Banana Tree at the Gate: A History of Marginal Peoples and Global Markets in Borneo. Michael R. Dove. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2011. Xix, 332 pp. Illus. Bibliography, indexes. ISBN 978‐0‐300‐15321‐7 (hardcover). $55.00.

There are significant differences between the folk biological taxonomy and nomenclature of hunter-gatherers and that of small-scale agriculturalists. While foragers possess sizable inventories of labeled plant and animal classes, small-scale farmers tend to have inventories that are considerably larger. Also, binomial names, such as English blue oak and shingle oak, are common in folk taxonomies of cultivators but rare in those of hunter-gatherers. An explanatory framework accounting for these findings is proposed which in part relates the larger taxonomies of farmers to (1) a diversity of ecotypes created by subsistence farming that supports a broadened range of wild organisms, (2) intensive utilization of wild plants and animals as "famine foods" when crops fail, and (3) the greater health risks of farmers, which motivate exceptional interest in organisms of medicinal value. The common occurrence of binomially labeled classes in taxonomies of agriculturalists is related to the lower salience of those taxa compared to the salience of classes labeled in taxonomies of foragers.