At Chacruna: New Urban Practices Around Kambô

Edilene Coffaci & Filipe Silva Ribeiro

What is this substance, and what does this secretion of a frog—spread on a global scale and claimed to be able to heal an extensive list of physical, psychological, and spiritual diseases—do? What is kambô? Nowadays, we see people advertising kambô applications in different countries, being considered experts on the subject, and promoting individual or collective sessions for which they pay between 100 and 300 dollars. We also see the emergence of associations responsible for training urban applicators and for legitimizing the practice in these contexts. Who has information more accurate than the attractive advertisements? As anthropologists with empirical experience with the native use of kambô, especially among Panoan language groups, we are intrigued by the various forms of kambô reinvention in large urban centers around the world. They are recent innovations, since, in the traditional use as realized by the indigenous inhabitants in the villages, among the connoisseurs of the practice, kambô is related to hunting and the elimination of the panema (bad luck in the hunt)... continue reading.