Synopsis of Project Proposal for "A History of the Krenak"

Historically, literature and documentaries on the Krenak, an indigenous peoples from the Minas Gerais Valley in Brazil have been made by the non-indigenous, resulting in misconceptions and incorrect interpretations. This is something that has been bringing many problems to our community. The interest for us who are Krenak is to show what really is happening today and the process that has caused it in the last 200 years.
The purpose of the documentary video we would like to make, “A History of the Krenak” is to tell the true story about how we were almost exterminated. It will be filmed in the Krenak Reservation in the municipality of Respendor, Minas Gerais. Shirley Adilson Silva Krenak who is the first indigenous person in the state of Minas Gerais to receive a university degree, will be the project coordinator.
The video will include the oral testimonies of elders (a practice, in common use among us for passing on information) who have survived the wars against the Krenak. How do the Krenak live today? What is the life of our people like after so many years of massacres (up to contemporary times)? And of our continued struggle for the return of our most sacred territory, the Sete Saloes which tourists desecrate by deliberately destroying carved ancestral drawings, vandalism, barbecues, mountain climbing and dirt bike racing inside the ceremonial area.
We hope that as a result of this documentary, the general public can have a better understanding of indigenous culture in Minas Gerais and in Brazil. Through this video we hope for more allies that are interested in the indigenous struggle.
We hope that as a consequence of this first documentary by an indigenous community that other videos can be made of other indigenous groups in Brazil who also have had strong genocidal contacts with the colonizer but who have survived