On the Andaman Islands, just off shore India, lives a tribe of 400 said to be one of the oldest people on the planet. Baring little resemblance to inhabitants of South East Asia, the Jarawa look more like people with creole ethnicity. According to recent DNA research, their lineage can be traced back thousands of years, possibly even as far as 70.000, making them the first people to leave Africa. How they got on these islands remains a mystery, but one thing is for sure: the Jarawa have lived secluded from the rest of the world for thousands and thousands of years and have done so with great prosperity. What is their secret? The documentary ‘We are humanity’ sets out to show the importance of community, the absence of property and a life lived in complete balance with surrounding nature; resulting in nothing less than a blissful state of being for the inhabitants of the Jarawa community.
However, ‘We are humanity’ also stresses the dangers these people are facing, now that they’ve become a tourist attraction and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to shut down from the modern world. Biggest threat seems to be the Indian government, having set it’s target on the riches of the Andaman islands to build resorts and expensive apartment complexes, leaving the future of the Jarawa people and their land at odds. Campaigns against these people revolve around stereotypes of their primitive and supposedly cannabalistic and therefor dangerous nature, which this documentary aims to eviscerate. For the first time ever, the Jarawa are telling their own story and we get to see their world through their own eyes.
Watch this short trailer in which directors Alexandre Dereims and Claire Beilvert tell you why and how they made the documentary and how we can help to save the Jarawa and their culture survive:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nta-AD7ThZE
Sign the petition here.
