Search Results (11)

“Know that in place of a heart I carry a tongue,” writes the unnamed poetic speaker of Mexican poet Balam Rodrigo’s Central American Book of the Dead. This documentary poetic text alternates between the voices of Central American immigrants journeying north and a subtle yet bold revision of Fray Bartolomé de las Casas’s A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies, with some words from the Friar’s 1552 text replaced by other words that reflect the realities of twenty-first century immigrants traveling north. Interspersed with de la Casas’s texts are persona poems in which we are invited to listen to the ghosts of immigrants who have suffered tragic deaths. This essay explores the ways that, crossing borders between time and space while drawing strength from his Christian faith, Rodrigo resists the erasure of Indigenous peoples, honors their journeys, and invites readers into solidarity. Full article

Background: Diasporic Indigenous peoples of Mexico living in the United States continue to survive and reclaim their cultures despite multiple disruptions to identity formation resulting from systematic violence and cultural silencing enacted through white settler colonialism in the United States and Mexico. Honoring Indigenous survivance, the authors present a conceptual model of Indigenous identity healing and reformation that mirrors the dynamic qualities of water for Indigenous Mexican peoples living in the United States. Methods: The conceptual model arose from a ceremony-based, participatory, digital archiving project documenting Indigenous oral histories. The model is illustrated through case analysis of three Indigenous Mexican individuals living in the United States whose stories holistically represent the model’s components. Results: The case narratives illustrate how Indigenous Mexican identities are (re)formed by moving through the model components of Rift (disconnection from land, culture, and community), Longing (yearning to find what was lost), Reconnecting (reclaiming cultural practices), and Affirmation (strengthening of identity through community), via Reflection (memory work which propels movement through each stage). Conclusions: Findings suggest that identities can be (re)formed through reclaiming cultural practices and reconnecting with the community. This conceptual model may be useful for further understanding Indigenous Latinx identity development and healing. Full article

Traditional medicine in Latin America and mainly in Mexico represents an essential alternative for treating different diseases. The use of plants as medicine is the product of a rich cultural tradition of the indigenous peoples, in which a great variety of species are used for the treatment of gastrointestinal, respiratory, and mental diseases and some other sicknesses; the therapeutic efficacy that they possess is due to the properties that derive from the active ingredients of plants principally antioxidants, such as phenolic compounds, flavonoids, terpenes, and tannins. An antioxidant is a substance that, at low concentrations, delays or prevents substrate oxidation through the exchange of electrons. Different methods are used to determine the antioxidant activity and the most commonly used are described in the review. Cancer is a disease in which some cells multiply uncontrollably and spread to other parts of the body, a process known as metastasis. These cells can lead to the formation of tumors, which are lumps of tissue that can be cancerous (malignant) or noncancerous (benign). Generally, the treatment of this disease consists of surgery, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy, which have side effects that decrease the quality of life of patients, so new treatments, focusing on natural resources such as plants, can be developed. This review aims to gather scientific evidence on the antioxidant compounds present in plants used in traditional Mexican medicine, specifically as antitumor treatment in the most common cancer types worldwide (e.g., breast, liver, and colorectal cancer). Full article

Chenopodium berlandieri (pitseed goosefoot) is a widespread native North American plant, which was cultivated and consumed by indigenous peoples prior to the arrival of European colonists. Chenopodium berlandieri is closely related to, and freely hybridizes with the domesticated South American food crop C. quinoa. As such it is a potential source of wild germplasm for breeding with C. quinoa, for improved quinoa production in North America. The C. berlandieri genome sequence could also be a useful source of information for improving quinoa adaptation. To this end, we first optimized barcode markers in two chloroplast genes, rbcL and matK. Together these markers can distinguish C. berlandieri from the morphologically similar Eurasian invasive C. album (lamb’s quarters). Second, we performed whole genome sequencing and preliminary assembly of a C. berlandieri accession collected in Manitoba, Canada. Our assembly, while fragmented, is consistent with the expected allotetraploid structure containing diploid Chenopodium sub-genomes A and B. The genome of our accession is highly homozygous, with only one variant site per 3–4000 bases in non-repetitive sequences. This is consistent with predominant self-fertilization. As previously reported for the genome of a partly domesticated Mexican accession of C. berlandieri, our genome assembly is similar to that of C. quinoa. Somewhat unexpectedly, the genome of our accession had almost as many variant sites when compared to the Mexican C. berlandieri, as compared to C. quinoa. Despite the overall similarity of our genome sequence to that of C. quinoa, there are differences in genes known to be involved in the domestication or genetics of other food crops. In one example, our genome assembly appears to lack one functional copy of the SOS1 (salt overly sensitive 1) gene. SOS1 is involved in soil salinity tolerance, and by extension may be relevant to the adaptation of C. berlandieri to the wet climate of the Canadian region where it was collected. Our genome assembly will be a useful tool for the improved cultivation of quinoa in North America. Full article

In 2019, residents of the rural district of San Rafael Comac in the municipality of San Andrés Cholula, Mexico, challenged the implementation of the 2018 Municipal Program for Sustainable Urban Development of San Andrés Cholula (MPSUD), a rapacious urban-planning policy that was negatively affecting ancestral communities—pueblos originarios—and their lands and traditions. In 2020, a legal instrument called the writ of amparo was proven effective in ordering the repeal of the MPSUD and demanding an Indigenous consultation, based on the argument of self-recognition of local and Indigenous identity. Such identity would grant them the specific land rights contained in the Mexican Constitution and in international treaties. To explain their Indigenous identity in the writ of amparo, they referred to an established ancient socio-spatial system of organization that functioned beyond administrative boundaries: the Mesoamerican altepetl system. The altepetl, consisting of the union between land and people, is appointed in the writ of amparo as the foundation of their current form of socio-spatial organization. This paper is a land-policy review of the MPSUD and the writ of amparo, with a case-study approach for San Rafael Comac, based on a literature review. The research concludes that Indigenous consultation is a key tool and action for empowerment towards responsible land-management in a context where private urban-development impinges on traditional land uses and customs, and could be beneficial for traditional communities in Mexico and other Latin American countries. Full article

In this article, I discuss how sky mapping was carried out among the Pa Ipai peoples from Baja California in Mexico. This mapping was elaborated through an interdisciplinary study that combined cybercartography, ethnography, cultural astronomy, semiotics, and collaborative work. The central argument of the article focuses on how the cybercartographic sky atlas of the Pa Ipai people responded to the situation and social problems of these communities. Some of these problems are extreme poverty, violence, and conflicts with the Mexican state and the academic world. In this context, the atlas and the collaborative work became tools that created links with indigenous families, especially with the young people. The mapping process also helped to resolve the tensions mentioned above. The article also addresses how the economic and political situation in Mexico has an effect on the preservation of the atlas. Some of the results of this work are that the Pai Ipai atlas allows, conserves, and renews songs, stories, and experiences around heaven. Another remarkable result is that the teenagers have positively received the atlas and the collaborative experience derived from it. Full article

This paper examines popular indigenous religiosity in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca in the 1990s, in the context of a “progressive” pastoral program formed within the campaign of the New Evangelization, and attuned to the region’s large indigenous population. Based on ethnographic research in an urban Oaxacan context, I offer an account of the popular Catholic ritualization of death which highlights its independence, and sensuous, material, collective orientation. I approach popular Catholicism as a field of potential tension, hybridity, and indeterminacy, encompassing the discourses and teachings of the Catholic Church in continuous interaction with people’s own sacred imaginaries and domestic devotional practices. Full article

Most studies on the determinants of poverty do not consider that the relative importance of each of these determinants can vary depending on the degree of poverty suffered by each group of poor people. For Mexico’s case, the studies carried out so far do not contemplate this approach, even though there is wide variation in the degree of poverty among the different groups of the poor. Investigating these differences is important to design better policies for fighting poverty, which consider how each variable that explains poverty affects each group of people who suffer from poverty differently. This article examines the determinants of poverty for Mexican households. Using data from the Mexican National Household Income and Expenditure Survey (ENIGH) 2018, the study estimates a probit model and a quantile regression model to examine the extent to which the determinants of poverty vary across the poverty spectrum. The results from the probit model indicate that households with more than one member, having a female head, or speaker of an indigenous language are more likely to be poor. The results obtained in the quantile regressions indicate that there are significant differences with the results of the simple ordinary least squares model, especially for households in extreme poverty but also for the other income categories analyzed for several of the explanatory variables used in the models. Households in the categories extremely poor and deeply poor are most affected if they are in the southern region or if the household head speaks an indigenous language or is an elderly person. It is observed that achieving a higher educational level is an effective way to increase income across the poverty spectrum. Full article

Recently, Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC) have encountered an escalation in adverse social conditions and trauma events in the United States. For individuals of Mexican ancestry in the United States (IMA-US), these recent events represent the latest chapter in their history of adversity: a history that can help us understand their social and health disparities. This paper utilized a scoping review to provide a historical and interdisciplinary perspective on discussions of mental health and substance use disorders relevant to IMA-US. The scoping review process yielded 16 peer reviewed sources from various disciplines, published from 1998 through 2018. Major themes included historically traumatic events, inter-generational responses to historical trauma, and vehicles of transmission of trauma narratives. Recommendations for healing from historical and contemporary oppression are discussed. This review expands the clinical baseline knowledge relevant to the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of contemporary traumatic exposures for IMA-US. Full article

The Mexican nation was built by the state. This construction involved the formulation and dissemination of a national identity to forge a community that shares common culture and social cohesion. The focus of the article is to analyze the myth of the origin of the nation, mestizaje, as this is a long-lasting formula of national integration. After more than a century of mestizaje, real or fictitious, Indigenous and Afro-descendant peoples have begun to question the capability of this common origin since it invalidates the origins of many other ethnic communities, especially in the current phase of the nation state, which refers to the recognition of cultural diversity. The myth is propagated by official means and is highly perceived by society, due to its high symbolic content that is well reflected in popular pictorial representations. The final part of the article will refer to the mestizo myth in the imagination of some Indigenous intellectuals and students, who hold their own ethnic myths of foundation or origin. Full article

An ethnobotanical study was performed to collect information on the use of medicinal plants in Papantla, Veracruz, Mexico. The area has a high number of endemic species, and the social importance of the medicinal plants in the community is essential for public health and the conservation of traditional knowledge. This study identified the medicinal plants currently used, registered traditional knowledge, and documented the patterns of ailments treated in the indigenous communities of Totonacas. A total of 101 medicinal plants belonging to 51 families were described by 85 local informants. Asteraceae was the family with the highest number of plant species identified by these informants. Plant parts are used to treat several ailments, including venomous bites, gastro-intestinal disorders, infectious diseases and other disorders. Informants reported that the most common plant part used was the leaf tissue (55%), and they also took the herbal remedies orally (72%), and decoctions (38%) as well as infusions (29%) were the forms used to prepare these natural remedies. This study provides documentation of medicinal plants used in the Veracruz area of Mexico. Mexican people are still dependent upon medicinal plants, and in order to avoid their loss, certain measures of conservation for medicinal plants are needed. Full article