Living for 5 days in and MST community definitely proved to be eye opening, but not quite in the way that I expected.
Land rights in Brazil are relatively complicated and stem from the last agrarian reform during the military government's push to develop the Amazon. Only 5% of the land here is actually owned by someone; the rest is government property that is leased out to various farmers and traditional populations. While the traditional populations have rights to the land indefinitely, farmers technically only own the land as long as they keep it productive. If the land is not productive for more than 6 months, the government technically can take over the property and redistribute it.
The idea behind the MST movement is for landless rural workers to reclaim the land that they believe to be owed to them by the government due to the PIN program. In theory, they occupy land of large farmers who claim much more land than they actually deserve/use and as a collective body "conquer" the land. In practice, many of those vying for land are not always rural workers. Every MST member I met was actually from the city and they had no interest in cultivating the land to sustain their families at all. While I am aware that all MST communities are different, the one I lived in was essentially developing very quickly but had no way to control the development and therefore was becoming a slum. I am not all too sure how I feel about the concept of MST both in theory or in practice, and I do not feel qualified to actually make any judgements, but what I will say is that this experience taught me that I can never come to a definitely conclusion about anything before experiencing what it is I feel the need to make a decision about.
My life with the MST mostly consisted of watching Barbie Disney Princess movies with my host sisters and helping to take care of the 1 year old baby. I had so much fun practicing Portuguese with them and teaching them ballet and my host family was absolutely lovely. It's funny how I find myself feeling so much more comfortable in my rural homestays than I do in Belem.
My research project is approved and I am leaving in the morning for Altamira. I will be living on a boat for another week with members of Xingu Vivo who will be taking me to various communities along the Xingu so that I can conduct interviews about the current fishing habits of these traditional populations. I cannot wait to begin my research and I hope I am able to accurately represent these people despite my sub par Portuguese...