The Tsimané, also known as the Tsimane' or Chimane, are an indigenous people of lowland Bolivia, living chiefly in the Beni Department municipalities of San Borja, San Ignacio de Moxos, Rurrenabaque, and Santa Ana del Yacuma.
Name
The Tsimané are also known as the Achumano, Chamano, Chimane, Chimanis, Chimanisa, Chimnisin, Chumano, Nawazi-Moñtji, and Ramano people.
[ "Chimane." Countries and Their Cultures. Retrieved 2 March 2012.]
Language
The Tsimané have their own language
Chimane language, which is a
language isolate having several dialect varieties, such as the Mosetén of Santa Ana and the Mosetén of Covendo which are mutually intelligible.
[Sakel, Jeanette A grammar of Mosetén, Mouton de Gruyter 2004.This study regards the language as spoken by some 800 people in the foothills and adjoining lowland area of the Bolivian Andes ]
Subsistence
They live in small communities composed of 20 to 30 families. Tsimané and Mosetén people depend mainly on subsistence farming, they cultivate bananas and
manioc through swidden agriculture, although hunting, fishing and gathering contribute significantly as a source of food for almost all communities.
[Bottazzi, Patrick (2014) Une écologie politique des territoires tsimane' d'Amazonie bolivienne : notre grande maison. Institut des hautes études internationales et du développement, Genève (Suisse); Karthala, Paris.] The population has been undergoing some degree of market integration over the past 15 years, and some Tsimane now participate in the cash economy.
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Health
Both the Tsimane' Amazonian Panel Study[Alejandro Millán, 'Deep in the Amazon rainforest lives a community whose hearts age more slowly BBC News 17 August 2024]
Tsimané sleep patterns have been studied as an example of "natural" sleep in nonindustrial or preindustrial societies, and to assess relationships between sleep patterns and health. Factors observed include sleep duration, timing, natural light, ambient temperature and seasonality. A normal daily pattern for a Tsimané group is to work during the day, congregate around a fire while cooking food, share a meal, then remain by the fire as it gets dark, sharing stories and information. Children and mothers tend to move away to sleep before male adults, with sleep onset occurring, on average, 3.3 hours after sunset. From beginning to end, sleep periods averaged 6.9–8.5 hours, with actual time slept of 5.7–7.1 hours, less sleep than reported in many industrial societies.
The average Tsimané woman has nine children in her lifetime. A study of 983 Tsimané women found that 70% were infected with the parasitic roundworm Ascaris lumbricoides, which is believed to have increased their fertility rate by suppressing their immune system, leading to two additional children over the course of a lifetime.
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