Tasaday

The Tasaday (pronounced TAW saw dye or Ta SAH dye) are a group (cf. tribe) of the deep and mountainous rainforests of the southern Philippine island of Mindanao who, up until the mid-20th century, were living as close to Stone Age lifeways as any people known in modern times.

Related Topics:
Group - Cf. - Tribe - Mountain - Rainforest - Philippine - Mindanao - 20th century - Stone Age - Lifeway

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The small group became known to other forest-dwellers outside their homeland around the 1950s, and in the early 1970s became known to Philippine officials and world media. Throughout the 1970s the Tasaday received world-wide press and the attention of anthropologists and other scholars due to the Tasaday's rare distinction as food-gatherers (they did not rely on agriculture), their unknown dialect, their reported isolation and their unfamiliarity with (among other modern articles) tobacco: a benchmark for isolation used by anthropologists due to its dense global diffusion since the 15th century.

Related Topics:
1950s - 1970s - Media - Anthropologists - Scholar - Gatherer - Agriculture - Dialect - Modern - Tobacco - Benchmark - 15th century

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In the 1980s, claims were made that the Tasaday were a hoax on the grounds that the "Tasaday" were merely members of known local tribes faking a Stone Age lifestyle. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, interviews, scientific research and inquiries by the Philippine government sought to differentiate between the real Tasaday, the hoax claims and the enthusiastic and sometimes overstated reports of the 1970s. Though some past studies had concluded with mixed results, the original hoax claims have been shown bogus and the Tasaday of the 1970s are now recognized as an authentic group surviving with primitive skills for at least seven generations (over 150 years by the 1970s), during which time they developed their own dialect of the Cotabato Manobo language.

Related Topics:
1980s - Hoax - 1990s - Scientific - Primitive - Generation - Year - Cotabato Manobo - Language

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Despite their small number in the 1970s and modern encroachment on and reduction of the rainforest in which they live, the Tasaday have survived into the 21st century, though their way of life has changed through contact with local tribes.

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