First of all, it is important to know that medicine songs are not commercial and are not meant to target massive audiences. These are songs for healing. Depeding on the listeners, some songs may seem monotonous unless they are in a ceremonial setting where the participants can feel the song’s power.<\/p>\n
The evidence I will introduce here is a ceremonial song for Ayahuasca ceremonies. This song\u2019s name is 4 Puntos (4 Directions). The author is Andr\u00e9s Cordoba, a Colombian medicine man or yagesero<\/em>. I decided to include a song as an evidence analysis for my project\u2019s purpose because medicine songs are always present during many ceremonies with sacred plants. Alonso del R\u00edo (2015), a medicine man from Peru, says that whereas healing through music is pretty unique to many Indigenous tribes in South America, healing through words is so to those from North America. I could not find any \u2018academic\u2019 evidence regarding what Del Rio says to present here, I decided then to choose a song for that purpose. This medicine song is a song of inclusion. Here is an excerpt\u00a0 of the lyrics:<\/p>\n Original version<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Samuy Mama Cona, Samuy Cankhe \u00d1a<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n Que venga mi Africa, America Central (bis)<\/p>\n Que venga mi Europa a Sudamerica (bis)<\/p>\n Lala lala lala\u2026<\/p>\n Que venga Quetzalc\u00f3atl que venga ya<\/p>\n Que venga Viracocha que llegue ya<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n Que venga Cristo que llegue ya<\/p>\n Que venga Buda que venga Al\u00e1<\/p>\n Que venga Mahoma llegue ya<\/p>\n \u00a0\u2026<\/p>\n (C\u00f3rdoba, 2013)<\/p>\n English Version<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Come in Great Mother, come in my people<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n Let the north and the south join now<\/p>\n Let Orient and Occident join now<\/p>\n Let the four points come gather now<\/p>\n at one single universal center.<\/p>\n Lala lala lala\u2026<\/p>\n Let my Africa and Center America come in now<\/p>\n Let my Europe and South America come in now<\/p>\n Lala lala\u2026<\/p>\n Let Quetzalcoatl let him come in now<\/p>\n Let Viracocha let him come in now<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n Let Christ let him come now<\/p>\n Let buda let Ala join now<\/p>\n Let Muhammad let him come in now<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n This song’s lyric is written in Spanish and Kichwa Inga (an Indigenous language from Putumayo, Colombia). The music of this song is powerful itself, but it needs to be understood in the context of its lyric as well. As mentioned before, it is a song of inclusion. It convokes people and deities from all over the four directions of the Earth in order to make of them “a universal family,” and the ceremonial space “one single universal center.” The singer does not exclude anyone, on the contrary, he is asking all cultures to gather and share the same space. \u00a0This song is consistent with that what occurs in most ayahuasca ceremonies, especially in South America. For most of the ceremony leaders, it does not matter what the religion of the participants is whenever they respect the medicine and the people there<\/em><\/span>. The medicine men\/women value people\u2019s differences and try to incorporate those particularities in the ceremonies within a margin of respect.<\/p>\n From a broader view, those small ceremonial spaces that promote inclusion are in great extent the milestone upon which alliances take place among many Aboriginal peoples in America. I hope I will gather enough data that can show in this project\u2019s final paper the alliances that take place among Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples through sacred plants and ceremonies like ayahuasca.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
\n