“I chose the field of law because it is a beneficial course for Indigenous people, for any Indigenous person, as I can be fighting for the cause of my people, defending our agendas. I even think that every village should have someone trained in the field of law to lead the struggle and have an understanding of what happens within public authorities.”
-Patrícia Juwi
Patrícia Juwi is an Indigenous member of the Amondawa people and lives in the village called Trincheira, within the Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau Indigenous land. This Indigenous territory is located in the Municipality of Mirante da Serra in the state of Rondônia, Brazil.
Patrícia is the second participating student in AmazoniAlerta’s Indigenous Law students bursary & internship program. She is a first-year law student in São Lucas University, in Rondônia, and plans to use her legal training to advance and defend the rights of her people. “I expect to make the most of the knowledge of the Law,” she says. Through an internship with AmazoniAlerta’s legal team Patrícia is gaining valuable experience about the practice and theory of Indigenous rights law.
Patrícia is the granddaughter of the great chief Tari Amondawa, and from him, she has learned much about the ancient stories and traditions of her people, as well as the Tupi Kawahib language.
She is 20 years old and, although Indigenous women traditionally marry and become mothers at a young age, Patrícia is single and has no children because she wants to study law and explore the world.
She lives in a house with her mother, two sisters, and two nieces. Her father passed away a few years ago, and they live in an all-female family. Fluent in her Indigenous language and Portuguese, Patrícia contributes to her family’s livelihood by working as an assistant to linguists who study the Indigenous peoples of the Tupi Kawahib language family.
Recently, she aided in research being conducted with the last two survivors of the massacres of the Piripkura people, who also speak the same language as Patrícia and lived in isolation until very recently.