Hauuš: some notes about traditional indigenous Yaghan ways of living with kelp in the Onashaga, or Beagle Channel

This paper compiles and contextualises the existing known relationships that the Yaghan, or Yamana, peoples had with Macrocystis pyrifera , the giant kelp so abundant in Fuegian waters. It utilises Reverend Thomas Bridges’ Yamana-English dictionary, compiled during the 1800s, as primary ethnohistorical source to structure and weave together mentions of kelp in other ethnographical sources for the area, and material culture insights from the extensive archaeological work carried out in the area of the Onashaga, or Beagle Channel. Notes about compared ethnophycological relations from elsewhere in the world are included when relevant, to suggest certain common themes in the environmental perception of kelp forests in sub-polar areas.