Virgínia Marcos Valadão (August 13, 1952 – June 2, 1998) was a Brazilian anthropologist, activist, and filmmaker who dedicated her life to indigenous rights and self-representation. Born in São Paulo to middle-class parents who were Catholic civil servants, she graduated with a degree in Social Sciences from Unicamp in 1977, where she also pursued postgraduate studies in Anthropology.
In 1979, Valadão co-founded the Indigenist Work Center (Centro de Trabalho Indigenista, CTI) alongside a group of young anthropologists, including her husband, Franco-Brazilian filmmaker Vincent Carelli. Serving as a director for nearly two decades, she conducted extensive fieldwork and authored numerous reports advocating for land demarcation and sustainable development. She lived and worked with the Xavante, Urubu Kaapor, Nhambiquara, Tembé, Tenetehara, Guarani, Tenharim, Enawenê-Nawê, Xokleng, and the isolated groups of the Omerê Creek. She wrote several reports and expert opinions based on fieldwork with these peoples. Notably, she served as a World Bank consultant for the Demarcation of Indigenous Lands in the Legal Amazon (PPTAL).
In 1986, Valadão and Carelli co-founded Vídeo nas Aldeias (Video in the Villages). The project sought to subvert traditional, exploitative ethnographic filmmaking by placing cameras directly into the hands of indigenous communities. By training these groups in video technology, Valadão helped introduce Brazil’s indigenous community to the power of making media as a tool for political resistance, identity preservation, and inter-tribal communication.
Virginia spent much of the year traveling from village to village. She was a woman of action who became deeply involved with the populations with which she had contact, thinking of the Indians as agents of their own destiny and guardians of their own memory. She did not hesitate to confront powerful landowners in defense of indigenous groups and their right to land. Her battle for subsidies for projects aimed at improving the lives of these groups was a constant throughout her life – one that was marked by courage, good humor and generosity.
Over her career, Valadão directed and produced five documentaries, including Wai’á, Morayngava, Free-for-all in Sararé, and Yãkwá: the Banquet of the Spirits, and co-authored the book Lords of these Lands – Indigenous Peoples in Brazil, from the Colonial Era to the Present Day (1991).
Valadão passed away in 1998 at the age of 45, leaving behind her husband and two children. Her profound bond with the communities she defended was mirrored in her burial, where indigenous leaders adorned her body with traditional tucum and tiririca necklaces and a Xavante tie. Among the many tributes paid to her by the indigenous groups with whom she lived and worked are a ritual of mourning and weeping performed by the Kraho and a Xavante girl who received her name, Virginia.
