Sacha Taki: Songs of the Forest
Our forest sings through all the living beings in it; we sing to the jungle, and we want it to be like this forever.” Nancy santi
2019
Sacha Taki means “songs and voices of the forest” and is an action research project which addresses cultural preservation and biological conservation through listening. Using innovative mobile and artistic participatory methods, University of Sussex researchers worked with the Pueblo Ancestral Kichwa Kawsak Sacha (PAKKS) peoples, an indigenous organisation in the province of Pastaza, in the Ecuadorian Amazon to help them register and articulate the ecological, cultural and spiritual value of their forests.
The primary action was to apply for Cultural-Natural Heritage status with the Ecuadorian State, toward gaining UNESCO heritage status. Creative outputs, including a short film and illustration, further help communicate the cosmovision of the PAKKS community: we understand the soundscape as a nexus between nature and culture and realise that we cannot understand and protect one without considering the other. These insights invite us to reconsider global conservation imperatives and to reflect on our own relationship with the rest of the natural world.
Sacha Taki was funded by Global Challenges Research Fund via Sussex Sustainability Research Programme, and supported by the Sussex Humanities Lab. The team includes Alice Eldridge (Reader in Sonic Systems and Co-Director of the Sussex Humanites Lab at the University of Sussex), Patta Scott-Villiers, Mika Peck with in country partners Paola Moscoso (in country lead), Gustavo Chiriboga (film), Sozapato (illustration) and Didier Lacaze (NGO partner, director Sacha Warmi).