Daniel Everett went into the Amazon rainforest fifty years ago as a missionary, to convert the native population. Instead, they converted him. For decades, he studied their languages, lived among them, held their babies, shared their food, and most importantly, listened to their stories. Born of the River is a collection of those stories, offering a rare glimpse into an endangered world. Among them are stories of the Sateré-Mawe, where boys come of age by participating in The Ant Dance; of becoming a Shaman among the Wari; of the hunting practices of the Banawá; and of the language of the Pirahã, for whom a word like Xibipíío gives an entirely new perspective on existence and being.

Daniel Everett went into the Amazon rainforest fifty years ago as a missionary, to convert the native population. Instead, they converted him. For decades, he studied their languages, lived among them, held their babies, shared their food, and most importantly, listened to their stories. Born of the River is a collection of those stories, offering a rare glimpse into an endangered world. Among them are stories of the Sateré-Mawe, where boys come of age by participating in The Ant Dance; of becoming a Shaman among the Wari; of the hunting practices of the Banawá; and of the language of the Pirahã, for whom a word like Xibipíío gives an entirely new perspective on existence and being.