Peace in the Tribal Zone: Non – violent interethnic relations at Latin American Frontiers

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

Interethnic relations in Latin America and elsewhere are generally known for precariousness, exclusions and occasional violent outbreaks. Especially the latter incidents receive most attention both in history and presence for the spectacular news they produce, and military reports are oftentimes the only detailed documentation available for Ethnohistorians interested in others than state- societies. While violent conflicts are thus highlighted in Frontier history for the amount of documentation they provide, more peaceful relations fail to do so. Our question is, therefore: what happens on the Frontier, when relations are seemingly peaceful?
The panel investigates different settings of interethnic relations in Latin American peripheries. Contributions to this panel explore interactions of indigenous groups and state actors, settlers or entrepreneurs concerning political, economic or social issues. Our main questions are how the different actors in spaces of cultural heterogeneity dealt with uncertainties about their counterpart’s intentions and expectations , tried to establish durable and inclusive modes of governance and, finally, reacted to breaches of trust or outbreaks of violence. In a comparative ethno- historical approach, the panel is focusing on examples of (intermittent) peaceful cohabitation in conflict zones, asking about its pre-conditions, durability and particular governance- settings.

Sub Track

• History and Historiography

Chairs

• Lasse Hölck, Freie Universität Berlin

• Stefan Rinke, Freie Universität Berlin

Individual Presentations

• Memoria, relaciones interétnicas y gobernanza en la tribal zone: el caso del Wallmapu (Araucanía chilena y la Patagonia Septentrional argentina) - Mónika V Contreras Saiz, Freie Universität Berlin

• Trust in the Tribal Zone? How to recognize independent Indians - Lasse Hölck, Freie Universität Berlin

• Entretejiendo la historia rural en los antiguos pueblos de indios. Trozos de lo añejo y de lo nuevo en México, siglos XIX y XX - Romana G Falcón-Meyer, El Colegio de Mexico

• Los indios de la “frontera” Guajira y su articulación política a los Estados de Colombia y Venezuela 1830-1880 - José Trinidad Polo Acuña, Universidad de Cartagena