ABSTRACT
Power relations in Amuesha society are always thought of and phrased in terms of the father-child relation. The powerful whether the divinities or the lesser spirits, the traditional priests or the local shamans - are always conceived of as father figures, while their followers are seen as their classificatory children. It has been widely accepted that in small face-to-face societies kinship and marriage systems provide the different sets of relationships that constitute either the structural framework within which power relations are enacted, or the idiom through which these relations are talked about. The Amuesha use the term pueyochresha' to refer to the followers of their past politico-religious leaders. This term is generally translated into Spanish as disa'pulos (disciples) or seguidores (followers).
