Eliane Potiguara: “I believe in the changing power of education”
Considered the first indigenous woman to publish a book in Brazil, writer Eliane Potiguara has earned the respect and admiration of scholars and readers of her works. In 2014, the author of A Terra É a Mãe do Índio (The Earth Is the Mother of the Indigenous - 1989) and Metade Cara, Metade Máscara (Half Face, Half Mask - 2004), among other titles, was bestowed with the Order of Cultural Merit by the Ministry of Culture. In 2021, she was conferred an honorary doctorate by the University Council of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ).Recognition as a writer, educator and political activist is no small feat. Especially for someone like her, who was only literate at the age of seven. At the time, she took on the task of writing the letters that, from Rio de Janeiro, her grandmothe...