{{More citations needed, date=October 2024 The Akwén or Akwẽ are a

Jê people Jê or Gê may refer to: *Jê languages *Jê peoples Jê or Gê are the people who spoke Jê languages of the northern South American Caribbean coast and Brazil. In Brazil, the Jê were found in Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais, Bahia, Piauí, Mato G ...

, who come from

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

and the

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

coast. Their language belongs to the central branch of the Jê family (trunk Macro-Ge) and has great linguistic proximity with the languages spoken by the

Xavante The Xavante (also Shavante, Chavante, Akuen, A'uwe, Akwe, Awen, or Akwen) are an indigenous people, comprising about 30,000 individuals within the territory of eastern Mato Grosso state in Brazil. They speak the Xavante language, part of the J� ...

and the Xacriabá. The people Akwén, speaker of the language 'Akwén', 'Akwẽ', 'Xerente', 'Cherente', 'Sherente', 'Serente' or Akwẽ Mrmẽze ("speech of the people") is organized into six '

clan A clan is a group of people united by actual or perceived kinship and descent. Even if lineage details are unknown, a clan may claim descent from a founding member or apical ancestor who serves as a symbol of the clan's unity. Many societie ...

s' ("dasiwawi mno"), divided into two 'parties' or "halves" ("dasĩmpko mno"). These two halves are named 'Doi' and 'Wahirê', associated with '

sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

' ('BDA': also 'god') and '

moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It Orbit of the Moon, orbits around Earth at Lunar distance, an average distance of (; about 30 times Earth diameter, Earth's diameter). The Moon rotation, rotates, with a rotation period (lunar ...

' (′WA′), respectively. Among them, the six clans are divided into two equal parts: Krito Tdêkwa, Kbazi Tdêkwa, Kuzâp Tdêkwa on the one hand, and Krozake Tdêkwa, Wahirê Tdêkwa, Krẽprehi Tdêkwa on the other. The

body painting Body painting is a form of body art where artwork is painted directly onto the human skin. Unlike tattoos and other forms of body art, body painting is temporary, lasting several hours or sometimes up to a few weeks (in the case of mehndi or ...

are different in each of the parties, prevailing the circle in the half ''′Doi′'', and stroke, which identifies the clans belonging to the ''′Wahirê′'' half.

Further reading