“Entering Law school means we Indigenous not so dependent on non-indigenous people. It allows us to have our autonomy. And I believe that through studying, this autonomy will only grow.”
-Jocivaldo Guajajara
Jocivaldo is the inaugural participant in AmazoniAlerta’s Indigenous Law students bursary & internship program. He is a fourth-year law student at UniBras College, who lives and studies in the municipality of Santa Inês, in the state of Maranhão.
As an intern he supports the legal team in their work and is focusing on learning about the law in relation to Indigenous land rights and territorial protection. For Jocivaldo, the experience he is gaining as an intern working with AmazoniAlerta’s experienced legal team is a powerful complement to his pursuit of his goals: “These issues of Indigenous rights, isolated peoples, we don’t see any of this in Law school,” he says, reflecting on a shortcoming in the curriculum of national law courses, which do not include Indigenous Rights as a subject.
When Jocivaldo became interested in issues involving Indigenous peoples, it didn’t take long for him to consider law school as a path. Now he is one of the few in his class who actually thinks about practicing law after graduating – especially in Indigenous causes. In the long term, he aims to work to support the rights of Indigenous peoples, especially in regard to his Guajajara community and contribute to the indigenous movement in general.
“I believe that entering Law school means we are not so dependent on non-indigenous people. It allows us to have our autonomy. Before that, in my community, for instance, everything was thought through according to non-indigenous people’s way of thinking, and nowadays we have this agency. And I believe that through studying, in different areas, this autonomy will only grow. From my village, I was the third person to enter university. Now, we have a more significant number of Indigenous students.”