Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
Date of Degree
6-2023
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Program
Anthropology
Advisor
Marc Edelman
Committee Members
Mary Roldan
Christopher Loperena
Greg Grandin
Subject Categories
Social and Cultural Anthropology
Keywords
Indigenous Kinship, Ground-Rent, Plantation, Rebellion
Abstract
Indigenous Maya in Guatemala lived through one of Latin America’s most intense conflicts during the second part of the twentieth century. This research focuses on Maya politics, kinship relations, and interethnic experiences in multifarious mobilization through social democratic parties, rural unions, and cooperatives (1966-1974), and the intricacies of Maya indigenous participation in peasant organizations and insurgencies during the war escalation (1976–1982). This work reassesses Maya indigenous communal politics beyond Cold War dichotomies and situates the villages as central loci to grapple with the complexity of indigenous history during the Guatemalan war. Through research in Akateko, Kaqchikel, K’iche’, and Ixil territories, this work explores plantations’ territoriality and labor transformations, ground-rent expansion, and interethnic relations between Maya peoples and Ladinos. By using methods in ethno-cartography, photo-elucidation workshops, memory visits, chronology of the war, in-situ interviews and focus groups, and recently found historical archives, memoirs, and photos, this research reconstructs the stories of Maya communal politics and individual militancy from the standpoint of indigenous narratologies of the war. This dissertation reinterprets one of Latin America’s Cold War paradigmatic cases from the standpoint of indigenous villagers.
Recommended Citation
Palencia Frener, Sergio G., "The Anti-Plantation Uprising: Indigenous Kinship, Territories, and Communal Politics in Guatemala, 1966-1982" (2023). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/5342