The Trumai are an indigenous group in Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

. They currently reside within the Xingu National Park

Xingu National Park

The Parque Nacional Xingu is located in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil and was created on April 14, 1961, signed by President Jânio Quadros. The area of the park is 2,642,003 ha., and it is contained in the municipalities of Mato Grosso; Canarana, Paranatinga, São Félix do Araguaia, São José do...

, in the state of Matto Grosso. They have a population of 147 (2006), up from a low of 26 in 1966.

The Trumai are considered one of the last groups to have settled on the upper Xingu River

Xingu River

The Xingu River , also called Rio Xingu, is a 1,230-mile long, river in north Brazil; it is a southeast tributary of the Amazon River.-Description and history:...

, moving there in the 19th century from the region between the Xingu and Araguaia River

Araguaia River

The Araguaia River or, in Portuguese, Rio Araguaia is one of the major rivers of Brazil, and the principal tributary of the Tocantins. It has a total length of approximately 2,627 km. Araguaia means "river of macaws" in the Tupi language....

s, as a result of attacks from another people. They currently live in four villages in the National Park, Terra Preta, Boa Esperança, Steinen and Terra Nova, situated halfway from the Leonardo Villas-Bôas Post and the Diauarum Indigenous Post, where some families also live.

The Trumai are agriculturists, growing primarily manioc, peppers, and beans. Most are Christian.

The Trumai language

Trumai language

Trumai is an endangered language isolate of Brazil. Most Trumai are fluent in languages of wider communication, and children are not learning it well.-Grammar:Phonology...

 is not closely related to other languages, and it is considered a language isolate

Language isolate

A language isolate, in the absolute sense, is a natural language with no demonstrable genealogical relationship with other languages; that is, one that has not been demonstrated to descend from an ancestor common with any other language. They are in effect language families consisting of a single...

. It is severely endangered, as children are becoming native speakers of Aweti, Suyá, or Portuguese

Portuguese language

Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...

.

The Trumai are one of the ethnicities included in the standard cross-cultural sample

Standard cross-cultural sample

The standard cross-cultural sample is a sample of 186 cultures, used by scholars engaged in cross-cultural studies.-Origin:Cross-cultural research entails a particular statistical problem, known as Galton's problem: tests of functional relationships can be confounded because the...

.

Further reading

• Robert F. Murphy and Buell Quain
  Buell Quain
  Buell Halvor Quain was an American ethnologist who, after graduating from Columbia University, worked with native peoples in Fiji and Brazil...
  
  . "The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil." American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Aug., 1956), p. 747
• Anne Sutherland Louis. "Alliance or Descent: The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil." Man, New Series, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Mar., 1971), pp. 18–29

External links

• Trumai language dictionary online from IDS (select simple or advanced browsing)
• Socioambiental page by Raquel Guirardello (Rice University)
• Trumai on the Documentation of Endangered Languages
• Homepage of a Trumai indigenous artist