This essay explores various reasons and politics behind learning a field research language that go beyond the merely pragmatic function of being a tool to collect data. Moreover, the role of language ...competency in one's field language is interlinked with the ethics of conducting research and by reflecting on specific ethnographic contexts in Guatemala, it is possible to explore some of the contours of participatory research. One dimension, the appropriate language competency in cultural context, collaboration is considered foundational to participatory research. It is argued that ethnographers’ collaborators and friends in their research sites shape the roles and language use. In some cases, it is unethical and culturally disrespectful to not use the language preferred by collaborators. In short, the language used in participatory projects is not just about data collection, it is an ethical choice.
This article addresses tensions between two dominant heritage practices in Antigua Guatemala, one that is oriented around the regulation of buildings and streets and another that is oriented around ...the regulation of people as cultural and economic performers. I place these regulatory practices within a framework that uses Latour's (2005) concepts of mediation and assemblage—the relationship between materiality and humans—to discuss the contexts of heritage politics and lived practices in heritage sites. This case study explores how UNESCO heritage politics and the Guatemalan state's regulation of Antigua's architecture and street workers are intertwined with tourism performance economies and residents' cultural aesthetics of the city. In describing Antigua's contemporary cityscape aesthetic, and, more specifically, the Arch of Santa Catalina, I draw on Latour's assemblage theory to interpret the heterogeneous ways in which the materiality of the city contributes to watercolor artists' social, economic, and political practices. I then draw on Rancière's (2006) theory of aesthetic regimes to make sense of individuals' everyday urban practices within public heritage sites. In other words, considering Rancière's and Latour's respective theories together approaches the analysis of a heritage site in a way that encompasses the everyday discourses, practices, and materiality of the Arch of Santa Catalina. Namely, I argue residents' heritage aesthetics, within the larger political, regulatory, and aesthetic apparatuses of the State and UNESCO, illustrate how urban heritage sites are an assemblage that articulates with everyday social and material practices that lead to unexpected political outcomes that are tied to cultural and economic practices.
A review essay covering: 1) The Ch’ol Maya of Chiapas. Edited by Karen Bassie-Sweet, with Robert M. Laughlin, Nicholas A. Hopkins, and Andrés Brizuela Casimir. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, ...2015. Pp. ix + 251. $45.00 hardcover. ISBN: 9780806147024; 2) Wellness beyond Words: Maya Compositions of Speech and Silence in Medical Care. By T. S. Harvey. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2013. Pp. vii + 256. $55.00 hardcover. ISBN: 9780826352736; 3) Maya Market Women: Power and Tradition in San Juan Chamelco, Guatemala. By S. Ashley Kistler. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2014. Pp. ix + 160. $44.68 paperback. ISBN: 9780252079887; 4) Southern Eastern Huastec Narratives: A Trilingual Edition. Translated and edited by Ana Kondic. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2016. Pp. vii + 197. $24.95 hardcover. ISBN: 9780806151809; 5) Indigenous Bodies, Maya Minds: Religion and Modernity in a Transnational K’iche’ Community. By C. James MacKenzie. Boulder: University Press of Colorado; Albany: Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, 2016. Pp. ix + 368. $34.95 paperback. ISBN: 9781607325567; 6) Songs That Make the Road Dance: Courtship and Fertility Music of the Tz’utujil Maya. By Linda O’Brien-Rothe. Forewords by Allen J. Christenson and Sandra L. Orellana. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2015. Pp. ix + 244. $72.93 paperback. ISBN: 9781477305386; and 7) Language and Ethnicity among the K’ichee’ Maya. By Sergio Romero. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2015. Pp. ix + 123. $50.00 hardcover. ISBN: 9781607813972.
This introduction explores particular ways in which participatory research is practiced in Mesoamerica by ethnographers. It provides an introduction to the history of participatory research and its ...interlinkages to a host of ethical concerns that are explored in greater depth in eight, reflexive ethnographic essays by anthropologists who conduct research in Guatemala and Mexico. This introduction and the ten essays in this issue, including two commentaries, present several, sometimes conflicting, discussions about the complicated processes of conducting ethnographic research in Mesoamerica and, in particular, what participatory research means in this linguistically and culturally diverse region of the world. In this introduction, key aspects of the history of participatory research are reviewed, as well as ethical issues related to consent and confidentiality in specific field sites that may conflict with the requirements of funding and academic institutions. This collection of essays aims to capture a panorama of ethnographic experiences in Mesoamerican field sites to highlight the collaborations, as well as the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas encountered in participatory research.
(I) can't use names even in field notes.
We can't anticipate how our representation will play out.
(We have an) ethical and moral duty to promote human rights.
People want money, not collaboration.
We provoke dialogues with people. We can engage other publics. We are possible facilitators of dialogue between different groups of people.
Like the original Harvest of Violence , published in 1988, this volume reveals how the contemporary Mayas contend with crime, political violence, internal community power struggles, and the broader ...impact of transnational economic and political policies in Guatemala. However, this work, informed by long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Mayan communities and commitment to conducting research in Mayan languages, places current anthropological analyses in relation to Mayan political activism and key Mayan intellectuals’ research and criticism. Illustrating specifically how Mayas in this post-war period conceive of their social and political place in Guatemala, Mayas working in factories, fields, and markets, and participating in local, community-level politics provide critiques of the government, the Maya movement, and the general state of insecurity and social and political violence that they continue to face on a daily basis. Their critical assessments and efforts to improve political, social, and economic conditions illustrate their resiliency and positive, nonviolent solutions to Guatemala’s ongoing problems that deserve serious consideration by Guatemalan and US policy makers, international non-government organizations, peace activists, and even academics studying politics, social agency, and the survival of indigenous people. CONTRIBUTORS Abigail E. Adams / José Oscar Barrera Nuñez / Peter Benson / Barbara Bocek / Jennifer L. Burrell / Robert M. Carmack / Monica DeHart / Edward F. Fischer / Liliana Goldín / Walter E. Little / Judith M. Maxwell / J. Jailey Philpot-Munson / Brenda Rosenbaum / Timothy J. Smith / David Stoll
All UNESCO urban World Heritage sites are strictly regulated. In Antigua, Guatemala, this includes building façades and streets, as well as the use of public places. Homeowners and building owners, ...however, challenge regulations by using unapproved paints, signs, and building materials. Residents modify building façades to accommodate cars and open walls to effectively blend home‐based businesses with the street. At the same time, street vendors contest regulated public spaces by behaving inappropriately by selling goods on public streets rather than designated marketplaces. Rather than conceive of property owners and vendors behavior as outside and in contrast to the building and street vending regulations, I reframe their actions within what I am calling urban spatial permissiveness, a concept I derive from Roy's (2004) theory of the unmapping—flexible regulation—of urban space. Antigua offers an ethnographic setting that shows how regulations are not always rigidly enforced but are negotiated to deal with everyday contingencies that relate to residents' and vendors' rights to the city (Harvey 2008). By way of conclusion I consider Foucault's concept of governmentality as a negotiated process, in order to argue that relationships between building regulations and public space usage reveal the limits of legality and strict enforcement policies.
Resumen
La seguridad es una preocupación creciente tanto de los residentes locales y turistas internacionales en Antigua, Guatemala. La ciudad no estaba preparada para el aumento de los delitos ...relacionados con el turismo y el tráfico de drogas. Representaciones locales y nacionales de la Antigua como un tranquilo pueblo colonial español han estado fuera de sincronía con la realidad. La respuesta del Estado a la delincuencia se ha producido en relación con el estado de Antigua como un sitio del Patrimonio Mundial. Basándose en el concepto de Taussig del “sistema nervioso” y la teoría de Agamben de “estado de excepción”, muestro los límites de Debord “sociedad del espectáculo”, en un contexto turístico transnacional en el que los residentes están preocupados por la delincuencia. Al centrar la atención etnográfica sobre la policía, le explico Antiguëños ‘y las actitudes de los mayas acerca de la policía es ambigua y se refieren a las opiniones acerca de los roles de seguridad y la policía. Mi análisis pone de relieve cómo el turismo gafas jugar a cabo en relación a la labor policial.
Security is a growing concern of both local residents and international tourists in Antigua, Guatemala. The city was ill prepared for the rise in crime associated with tourism and drug trafficking. Local and national representations of Antigua as a tranquil Spanish colonial town have been out of sync with this reality. The state's response to crime has occurred in relation to Antigua's status as a World Heritage site. Drawing on Taussig's concept of the “nervous system” and Agamben's theory of “state of exception,” I show the limits of Debord's “society of the spectacle” in a transnational tourism context in which residents are preoccupied with crime. By focusing ethnographic attention on policing, I explain that Antiguëños’ and Mayas’ attitudes about the police are ambiguous and relate to opinions about safety and police roles. My analysis highlights how tourism spectacles play out in relation to policing.
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