Religion, dualité de l'âme et représentations du tekó porã et du tekó vai chez les peuples guarani

Abstract

This article deals with questions relating to the
duality of the soul among two Guarani groups of Brazil : the
Mbya and the Kayowâ. The analysis is based on classical and
contemporary studies, as well as on the ethnographic data of
the authors. They maintain that for these Guarani groups, con
temporary daily life still largely orients itself around a vast and
complex mythological corpus. It is through this corpus that one
establishes an opposition between two models of personality,
which serve as regulators for individual and collective actions.
The Tekô Vai, a "non appropriate way of being," is thus pre
sented in opposition with the Tekô Porâ, an ideal model, which
determines the "good way of being," itself governed by ancestral
and sacred precepts.