Yumi Watanabe went to the Peruvian rainforest for her master’s thesis in visual and media anthropology. She investigated the dreams that Shipibo healers have during their training (diata) and analyzed them using scientific methodologies. In the interview, she talks about how she came across her research topic and what plans she would like to pursue after her master’s degree.
You recently completed the Master’s program in Visual and Media Anthropology at the Media University Berlin – and received a very good grade for your master’s thesis. Congratulations! For your thesis, you conducted research on the topic of “Human-Plant-Kinship” in the Amazon in Peru. That sounds pretty impressive! Please tell us more about it!
In my thesis, I tried to visualize the ontological realities of the Shipibo healers, the Onayas, who live in eastern Peru. To do this, I focused on their dreams that they experienced during the training called dieta and asked an experienced Onaya to interpret these dreams. I then linked the dream interpretations of an Onaya to Shipibo cosmology and examined the relationships between Onayas and plant spirits that arise in dreams from the perspective of Shipibo cosmology.
Dieta is the training of the Onayas, during which they eat certain plant maestros and observe certain fasting rules. Plant maestro is a collective term for potable plants used for the dieta. The Onayas believe that each plant maestro has their own “world,” as well as spirits and the knowledge to heal people.
From what the Onayas explained to me, only when they contact the spirits of the plant maestros through dreams they experience during the dieta are they given knowledge of the present environment, prophetic information, and ikaros (healing chants). When they finally complete the dieta and take ayahuasca at the healing ceremony, the plant spirits they practiced the dieta with take over their bodies and have them chant icaros to heal others.
In short, for the Shipibo Onayas, the dreams they see during the dieta serve as a medium through which they discover how to establish relationships with the plant spirits, ultimately gaining the healing ability to help others. To investigate this role of the dream, I recorded a total of about 60 dreams that two experienced Onayas, Carlos and Maria (pseudonyms), had during a month-long dieta with the same plant maestro. I then asked Maria to interpret each dream, focusing on how she intended to establish relationships with the plant spirits. I hypothesized that these dream interpretations could provide important clues about human-plant relationships, which are often established through embodied and semiotic means of relating. However, my initial attempt to do so supported the thesis put forward by Tedlock: “The interpretations of dreams can only be properly understood in the context of the particular ontologies and of the religious and psychic life in each society” (‚Uni and Quiche Dream Sharing and Interpreting‘. In B. Tedlock (Ed.), Dreaming: Anthropological and Psychological Interpretations, Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research, 1992:105-131). In the case of the Onayas, this meant that close attention had to be paid to the concept of Niwe and Neto, which constitutes the Shipibo cosmology. The diagram below illustrates the cosmology of an Onaya.
Based on this theoretical thesis that connects the dream interpretations of the Onayas with the Shipibo cosmology, I classified the dreams seen by Maria and Carlos based on their interpretations and examined the type of relationships established and their shamanic goals from the perspective of niwe and neto. In this way, I was finally able to represent the ontological reality of the Onayas, in which they coexist with various non-human beings on a daily basis and continuously establish relationships with plant spirits to gain healing abilities.
Can you tell us a little about how you found your subject? What was the most important thing you learned from this work?
I first visited Carlos in 2017 to practice the Dieta because my Peruvian friend recommended him as an experienced and recognized Onaya. So my initial motivation for visiting him was not to do research. Nonetheless, from July 2017 to August 2019, I collected ethnographic data and archived them for the nativesoon project, which is a joint project between me and my husband.
On August 6, 2017, I wrote in my fieldnote: “We asked Carlos to keep a dream diary for a month during the dieta. I gave him a notebook so he could write down his dreams.” This was my husband’s idea, because he thought that this way we could find out how Carlos perceives the world. At the beginning, I did not have great expectations about the result and did not know anything about the role of dreams during the dieta. However, when Carlos came to me with 33 dream episodes written down in Spanish, I became interested in dream interpretation. For example, the excerpt below is part of his dream from the first day of the dieta.
In this dream, I landed in a faraway village after traveling on a river with the Jhousou. Although the village was large, only three people lived there. One of them was a man, the other two were women. This man was a king, and one of the women was a queen and his wife. The other woman was a princess, her daughter. We left the boat and went to a building that was the king’s house.
His detailed descriptions of who he met, where he was and what he did with these people made me think about the connection between these dreams and the knowledge acquired through the Dieta.
Therefore, I went in search of an Onaya who could translate the 33 dream episodes, since I had left his house without asking him to interpret them. In April 2021, my Shipibo friends, who came from an Onaya family, recommended their relative Onaya, Maria, to me for dream interpretation. So I asked them to start a month-long diet with the same plant maestro that Carlos had practiced with in 2017, together with my husband and me, and to interpret their own dreams, as well as ours. In this way, I had discovered my research topic and developed the fieldwork on the topic.
Through this research experience, I learned the importance of persistence and flexibility. I went to the Onayas and kept asking. Although I often felt useless, I never stopped piecing together a picture from scattered, seemingly irrelevant pieces, inspired by conversations with Carlos and Maria. It was just a beautiful moment, trying to understand that they perceive reality in a very different way.
Why did you choose to study M.A. Visual and Media Anthropology?
Since I spent more time with the Onayas, I have been trying to visualize the ontological realities of the Onayas through academic means. I was fascinated by combining the anthropological study of the Onayas with visual techniques in the form of film, photography and an installation. To put this desire into action, visual and media anthropology was the only option.
Which experiences/courses/projects during your studies do you think will benefit you the most for your future career?
Courses such as “Space and Place”, “Media Activism” and “Autoethnography” gave me a good insight into the future world of work. In particular, the topic I worked on in the course “Space and Place” could be a research topic in the future. I investigated the home garden as an everyday space where I can actually engage with non-human beings. The insights I gained in this course allowed me to look at the relationships between humans and non-human beings from the perspective of space. It was a very enlightening experience.
What do you like most about your studies/the course in general?
The diversity of the study program. I never thought that studying anthropology would be so interesting. And the 2-week in-house course on campus in Berlin was fantastic. I really want to see my fellow students again in Berlin soon!
Yumi Watanabe
What advice do you have for (prospective) students who are thinking about studying Visual and Media Anthropology at Media University?
If you are looking for an opportunity to combine academic research with visual techniques, the two years of this course will be very exciting for you. You should also ask yourself if you are self-disciplined. Since this course requires students to be self-sufficient, those who prefer to learn step by step with lectures and friends in a physical classroom might have difficulty grasping the course content.
What are your plans for the future?
I am considering starting a PhD to specialize in the field of anthropology on the relationships between humans and non-humans. However, I am still considering whether to continue researching the Shipibo Onayas or conducting a comparative study on medical marijuana in Japan and other countries. In any case, I am now interested in visualizing fantasies or psychological constructs shared by society, while at the same time illustrating how these plants are banned or spread in everyday space. As I prepare for my PhD, I would like to initially show my work in exhibitions, trying to share the findings from my research in the form of films and installations. I would also like to release an album of the healing chants of the Onayas that I recorded during my many years of field research.
Thank you very much for the exciting insights into your master’s project. We wish you all the best for the future!
