The story of Piler Wakan

La historia de Piler Wakan

Object Details

Subject LanguageKuna, San Blas
Language PID(s)ailla:119499
Title [Indigenous]
Language of Indigenous Title
TitleThe story of Piler Wakan
Language Community
Country(ies)Panama
Place CreatedKuna Yala and Darien
Date Created1977-12-02
Description [Indigenous]
Language of Indigenous Description
DescriptionThe story of Piler Wakan (the nephews of Piler). Piler or Olopilipiler was an early culture hero who was disappointed by his descendants, who went their separate ways (Aiban Wagwa 2000: 15-22, Chapin 1989:25-29).

The speaker, Sakla (Chief) Gonzalo Salcedo of the village of Niatupu or Tigantiki, recorded a number of narratives, cosmological descriptions, and elaborate metaphors from the chiefly tradition called Pap Ikar (Father's Way). The initial recording was of an unstaged teaching session in which Chief Salcedo instructed another village leader. In each of the subsequent recordings, made between the early 1970s and the mid-1990s, Chief Salcedo narrated one historical/mythological episode, one set of didactic metaphors, or one aspect of Kuna cosmology. The narratives were spoken into the tape recorder privately at home, without a Kuna audience, but the manner of the narration was almost identical with that used in the initial teaching session and in other teaching sessions that were not recorded. For one of the narratives, the Story of Inananatil (analyzed in Howe & Hirchfeld, 1981), Chief Salcedo was also recorded chanting the story in the gathering house of Ukkuppa village in 1975, offering an opportunity to compare the spoken and chanted narratives.
GenresNarrative
Source Notereel 5.2
References
Contributor(s) Individual / RoleSalcedo, Gonzalo (Speaker)
Howe, James (Researcher)
Contributor(s) Corporate / Role

Media Files

There are 2 objects in this resource
ObjectFile TypesAccess Level
CUK003R018I001.wav1
CUK003R018I001.mp3audio/mp31

Details