Literacy and Power in Mesoamerica

Author(s):  
Gloria Elizabeth Chacón

Chapter 1 explores Maya and Zapotec systems of communication and contradictory colonial representations about Mesoamerican writing. It argues that writing and power were already interrelated in Mesoamerican indigenous communities so that the attribution of orality to indigenous peoples disavows the key role of pre-Columbian writing. It ends by discussing indigenous colonial texts as well as poetry framed through a double optic or kab’awil by foundational Maya and Zapotec authors such as Gaspar Pedro González, Macario Matus, and Victor de la Cruz.

Genealogy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 52
Author(s):  
Bronwyn Carlson ◽  
Tristan Kennedy

Social media is a highly valuable site for Indigenous people to express their identities and to engage with other Indigenous people, events, conversations, and debates. While the role of social media for Indigenous peoples is highly valued for public articulations of identity, it is not without peril. Drawing on the authors’ recent mixed-methods research in Australian Indigenous communities, this paper presents an insight into Indigenous peoples’ experiences of cultivating individual and collective identities on social media platforms. The findings suggest that Indigenous peoples are well aware of the intricacies of navigating a digital environment that exhibits persistent colonial attempts at the subjugation of Indigenous identities. We conclude that, while social media remains perilous, Indigenous people are harnessing online platforms for their own ends, for the reinforcement of selfhood, for identifying and being identified and, as a vehicle for humour and subversion.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 942-954
Author(s):  
Mauricio Viana Gomes Oliveira ◽  
Ângela Maria Mendes Abreu ◽  
James R. Welch ◽  
Carlos E. A. Coimbra

Our objective is to critically review the literature addressing the strategic role of nurses in the daily primary care of arterial hypertension in Indigenous communities in Brazil. We selected studies based on an initial keyword search of major bibliographic indexing databases for the years 2000 to 2020 and manual search. Further selection was based on topical, methodological, and thematic relevance, as well as evaluation of scholarship quality and pertinence to our chosen narrative. The literature demonstrates Indigenous peoples do not receive health services that measure up to national standards in large part due to a marked lack of academic and employer preparation for nurses operating in transcultural settings. Inequities were apparent in recurrent reports of victim-blaming, deficient clinical communication with patients, clinical malpractice, devaluation of hypertension as a problem for Indigenous peoples, insufficient intercultural training for nurses, and discrimination against Indigenous students in nursing education programs. This systemic problem needs to be addressed by universities and the Indigenous Health Care Subsystem in Brazil.


1970 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 37-52
Author(s):  
Anna Helena Wądołowska

The article was originally published without an abstract. Short description: The article relates to the role of folk midwifery in social processes among indigenous communities in Michoacán. In the 1970s the Mexican government decided to include practitioners of traditional medicine as assistants in public clinics. The intention was to facilitate acceptance of western medicine among the indigenous population. The article describes the practice of integrating traditional healers and midwifes in Michoacán, and the indigenous peoples’ and doctors’ opinions on it. Short description written by Michal Gilewski


Comunicar ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 17 (34) ◽  
pp. 114-125
Author(s):  
Manuel Cebrián-de-la-Serna ◽  
Juan Noguera-Valdemar

The current essay presents the results of research into sustainable development and environmental education that was developed in the sub-region of Amazonia-Orinoquia (Amazonas State, Venezuela) from 2005 to 2008. This study was undertaken within a qualitative methodology framework where field trips and the collaboration of indigenous communities in particular were crucial. Unlike other projects currently taking place in the area, our investigation established a different connection with indigenous communities. The study considered indigenous peoples both as subjects and objects of the analysis, for which a written agreement was negotiated and signed at the beginning of the project about what to study and how to proceed with our research. Several data collection techniques were used: interviews with key informants, discussion groups and surveys. Two of the goals were: to analyse the knowledge that indigenous peoples have about the environment and sustainability, particularly regarding the cultural role of ethnicity; to design and elaborate educational materials that address issues about environmental education related to the cultural role that ethnic groups play in species preservation. These objectives were reached thanks to the response of 12 different indigenous peoples of different ethnic and linguistic backgrounds after visiting 17 communities. El presente artículo expone los resultados de un proyecto de investigación sobre el desarrollo sostenido y educación ambiental desarrollado en la subregión Amazonia-Orinoquia (Estado de Amazonas, Venezuela) desde 2005 a 2008. La investigación se enmarca dentro de una metodología cualitativa, donde la colaboración de los pueblos indígenas y la visita en el terreno fueron cruciales. A diferencia de otros proyectos desarrollados en la zona, el trabajo estableció una relación diferente con las comunidades indígenas. En este proyecto se consideraba a los pueblos indígenas como objetos y sujetos de la investigación, recogiendo en una carta firmada los compromisos del proceso negociador realizado al inicio del proyecto sobre qué y cómo realizar la investigación. Se utilizaron diversas técnicas de recogida de datos: entrevistas a informantes clave, grupos de discusión y encuestas. Se describen solamente dos de los diversos objetivos y resultados del proyecto, a saber: 1) Analizar los conceptos que poseen los pueblos indígenas sobre el medio ambiente y la sostenibilidad, especialmente en su relación con el papel cultural de las etnias; 2) Diseñar y elaborar materiales didácticos en los que se trabajen los conceptos de educación ambiental relacionados con el papel cultural de las etnias en la conservación de las especies. Estos objetivos fueron alcanzados gracias a la respuesta de doce pueblos indígenas de lenguas y etnias diferentes tras la visita a diecisiete comunidades distintas.


Sains Insani ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 20-28
Author(s):  
Aping Sajok

This study is related to the practice of slavery happened in indigenous communities in North Borneo since under the rule of the Sultanate of Sulu and Brunei. The aim of this study to see how slavery is considered as a unique practice and the slave role in daily life, including the type of slaves and relationship between the slave and their owners. This study will use information about slavery in North Borneo which are available from various sources such as diary, Official records of British North Borneo Chartered Company (BNBCC), Reports, News paper, Microfilm, books and articles. Slavery in North Borneo basically influenced by the role of datu’s and pengiran of the Sulu Sultanate and Brunei which sparked demand for slaves. This causes a form of slavery that occurred in the indigenous tribes such as Suluk, Bajau, Iranun, Dusun and Murut. The practice of slavery grow rapidly along with pirate activities which are intertwined with the slave trading in the Borneo sea. However, before settling by James Brooke in Sarawak and BNBCC in North Borneo, the abolition of slavery activities was implemented. Keywords: Slavery, Sulu, Brunei, Native, History, North Borneo, Abstrak: Kajian ini adalah berkaitan dengan amalan perhambaan yang berlaku dalam masyarakat peribumi di Borneo Utara sejak dibawah pengaruh Kesultanan Sulu dan Brunei. Kajian ini bertujuan untuk melihat bagaimana amalan perhambaan dianggap sebagai sebuah amalan yang unik dan peranan golongan hamba tersebut dalam kehidupan harian termasuklah jenis hamba dan bentuk hubungan di antara hamba itu sendiri dan pemilik hamba. Kajian ini akan menggunakan maklumat mengenai perhambaan di Borneo Utara yang boleh didapati daripada pelbagai sumber seperti catatan diari pegawai British, rekod-rekod Syarikat Berpiagam Borneo Utara British (SBBUB), laporan, akhbar, Mikrofilem, Buku-buku dan Artikel yang telah dihasilkan oleh sarjana awal. Perhambaan di Borneo Utara pada dasarnya banyak dipengaruhi oleh peranan pembesar daripada Kesultanan Sulu dan Brunei yang mencetuskan permintaan terhadap hamba. Hal tersebut menyebabkan wujud perhambaan yang berlaku dalam suku peribumi seperti Suluk, Bajau, Iranun, Dusun dan Murut. Amalan ini berkembang pesat bersama dengan aktiviti perlanunan yang saling berkait dengan perdagangan hamba di sekitar perairan Borneo. Namun demikian, menjelang pertapakan James Brooke di Sarawak serta SBBUB di Borneo Utara, penghapusan aktiviti perhambaan ini telah dijalankan. Kata kunci: Perhambaan, Sulu, Brunei, Peribumi, Sejarah, Borneo Utara,


2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeremy M. Mikecz

Ethnohistorians and other scholars have long noted how European colonial texts often concealed the presence and participation of indigenous peoples in New World conquests. This scholarship has examined how European sources (both texts and maps) have denied indigenous history, omitted indigenous presence, elided indigenous agency, and ignored indigenous spaces all while exaggerating their own power and importance. These works provide examples of colonial authors performing these erasures, often as a means to dispossess. What they lack, however, is a systematic means of identifying, locating, and measuring these silences in space and time. This article proposes a spatial history methodology which can make visible, as well as measurable and quantifiable the ways in which indigenous people and spaces have been erased by colonial narratives. It presents two methods for doing this. First, narrative analysis and geovisualization are used to deconstruct the imperial histories found in colonial European sources. Second it combines text with maps to tell a new (spatial) narrative of conquest. This new narrative reconstructs indigenous activity through a variety of digital maps, including ‘mood maps’, indigenous activity maps, and maps of indigenous aid. The resulting spatial narrative shows the Spanish conquest of Peru was never inevitable and was dependent on the constant aid of immense numbers of indigenous people.


Author(s):  
Shailesh Shukla ◽  
Jazmin Alfaro ◽  
Carol Cochrane ◽  
Cindy Garson ◽  
Gerald Mason ◽  
...  

Food insecurity in Indigenous communities in Canada continue to gain increasing attention among scholars, community practitioners, and policy makers. Meanwhile, the role and importance of Indigenous foods, associated knowledges, and perspectives of Indigenous peoples (Council of Canadian Academies, 2014) that highlight community voices in food security still remain under-represented and under-studied in this discourse. University of Winnipeg (UW) researchers and Fisher River Cree Nation (FRCN) representatives began an action research partnership to explore Indigenous knowledges associated with food cultivation, production, and consumption practices within the community since 2012. The participatory, place-based, and collaborative case study involved 17 oral history interviews with knowledge keepers of FRCN. The goal was to understand their perspectives of and challenges to community food security, and to explore the potential role of Indigenous food knowledges in meeting community food security needs. In particular, the role of land-based Indigenous foods in meeting community food security through restoration of health, cultural values, identity, and self-determination were emphasized by the knowledge keepers—a vision that supports Indigenous food sovereignty. The restorative potential of Indigenous food sovereignty in empowering individuals and communities is well-acknowledged. It can nurture sacred relationships and actions to renew and strengthen relationships to the community’s own Indigenous land-based foods, previously weakened by colonialism, globalization, and neoliberal policies.


2006 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 98-100
Author(s):  
Muhamad Ali

Studies of Islam in Southeast Asia have sought to better understand its multifacetedand complex dimensions, although one may make a generalizedcategorization of Muslim beliefs and practices based on a fundamental differencein ideologies and strategies, such as cultural and political Islam.Anna M. Gade’s Perfection Makes Practice stresses the cultural aspect ofIndonesian Muslim practices by analyzing the practices of reciting andmemorizing the Qur’an, as well as the annual competition.Muslim engagement with the Qur’an has tended to emphasize the cognitiveover the psychological dimension. Perfection Makes Practice analyzesthe role of emotion in these undertakings through a combination ofapproaches, particularly the history of religions, ethnography, psychology,and anthropology. By investigating Qur’anic practitioners in Makassar,South Sulawesi, during the 1990s, Gade argues that the perfection of theQur’an as a perceived, learned, and performed text has made and remade thepractitioners, as well as other members of the Muslim community, to renewor increase their engagement with the holy text. In this process, she suggests,moods and motivation are crucial to preserving the recited Qur’an and revitalizingthe Muslim community.In chapter 1, Gade begins with a theoretical consideration for her casestudy. Drawing from concepts that emphasize the importance of feeling andemotion in ritual and religious experience, she develops a conceptualizationof this engagement. In chapter 2, Gade explains memorization within thecontext of the self and social relations. She argues that Qur’anic memorizershave a special relationship with its style and structure, as well as with thesocial milieu. Although Qur’anic memorization is a normal practice for mostMuslims, its practitioners have learned how to memorize and recite beautifullysome or all of the Qur’an’s verses, a process that requires emotion ...


Author(s):  
Elena F. GLADUN ◽  
Gennady F. DETTER ◽  
Olga V. ZAKHAROVA ◽  
Sergei M. ZUEV ◽  
Lyubov G. VOZELOVA

Developing democracy institutions and citizen participation in state affairs, the world community focuses on postcolonial studies, which allow us to identify new perspectives, set new priorities in various areas, in law and public administration among others. In Arctic countries, postcolonial discourse has an impact on the methodology of research related to indigenous issues, and this makes possible to understand specific picture of the world and ideas about what is happening in the world. Moreover, the traditions of Russian state and governance are specific and interaction between indigenous peoples and public authorities should be studied with a special research methodology which would reflect the peculiarities of domestic public law and aimed at solving legal issue and enrich public policy. The objective of the paper is to present a new integrated methodology that includes a system of philosophical, anthropological, socio-psychological methods, as well as methods of comparative analysis and scenario development methods to involve peripheral communities into decision-making process of planning the socio-economic development in one of Russia’s Arctic regions — the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District and to justify and further legislatively consolidate the optimal forms of interaction between public authorities and indigenous communities of the North. In 2020, the Arctic Research Center conducted a sociological survey in the Shuryshkararea of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District, which seems to limit existing approaches to identifying public opinion about prospects for developing villages and organizing life of their residents. Our proposed methodology for taking into account the views of indigenous peoples can help to overcome the identified limitations.


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