Returning to the Roots: Territorial Defense, Historical Memory and Ethnic Revival in Michoacán, Mexico

• In Event: Tierras, territorios y pueblos indígenas y racismo ambiental

Abstract

On September 24th, 1715, at the City of Pátzcuaro, the native authorities of the Indian Republic of “Guecorio,” denounced the invasion of their lands by the landowner from the San Nicolás hacienda, and requested that their boundaries were respected. A fragment of the report reads: “[the landowner] impairs the possession of our lands, which we have owned peacefully, in accordance with the measures recognized by the Real Audiencia and Cancillería of New Spain… [the landowner] has seized a significant portion of our lands, trespassing the boundaries, erecting fences on what is ours, without any further authority than that of bad intention.” Huecorio is a P’urhépecha community located in Michoacán’s Lake Pátzcuaro Basin. In 2016, Huecorio presented a petition to the municipality of (Pátzcuaro) to regain its political standing as Comunidad Indígena. Such request evolved from a political conflict with the municipal government, which sought to abolish the community’s title as Jefatura de Tenencia (small settlements with sub-municipal status) and incorporate it into the city as one of its districts. This paper examines the process of ethnic revival in Huecorio, enhanced by the recovery of the people’s historical memory as a mechanism of territorial defense. Framed within an ethnohistorical approach, the paper shows that ethnic revival has fostered the emergence of the community’s political consciousness. I argue that the recovery of the people’s historical memory does not imply the return to a romanticized, pre-Hispanic past, but rather the appropriation of history as a vehicle of transformation and defense.

Author

• Sandra J Gutierrez, University of Minnesota/Morris