Elusive Unity: Factionalism and the Limits of Identity Politics in Yucatán, Mexico (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781607323532)

In Elusive Unity, Armstrong-Fumero examines early twentieth-century peasant politics and twenty-first-century indigenous politics in the rural Oriente region of Yucatán.

The rural inhabitants of this region have had some of their most important dealings with their nation's government as self-identified "peasants" and "Maya." Using ethnography, oral history, and archival research, Armstrong-Fumero shows how the same body of narrative tropes has defined the local experience of twentieth-century agrarianism and twenty-first-century multiculturalism.

Through these recycled narratives, contemporary multicultural politics have also inherited some ambiguities that were built into its agrarian predecessor. Specifically, local experiences of peasant and indigenous politics are shaped by tensions between the vernacular language of identity and the intense factionalism that often defines the social organization of rural communities. This significant contribution will be of interest to historians, anthropologists, and political scientists studying Latin America and the Maya.

Author: Fernando Armstrong-Fumero
ISBN-10: 1607323532
ISBN-13: 9781607323532
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
Language: English
Published: 11/15/2014
Pages: 220
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.95lbs
Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 0.70d