más cerca del hogar

(cross-posted @ fieldnotes)

In Orin Starn’s 1991 article, “Missing the Revolution,” he chastised anthropologists for missing signs of the rise of Sendero Luminoso [Shining Path], the Peruvian Maoist insurgent organization. He suggests anthropologists were too absorbed in Andeanism, a term he borrows from Edward Said’s Orientalism, to mean depictions of life in the Andes that portray contemporary peoples as outside the flow of modern history (395). Because of their narrow focus, they missed the important politics and historical dynamics that fomented the rise of groups like Shining Path. As he wrote, for hundreds of anthropologists…the rise of the Shining Path came as a complete surprise” (395).

Many anthropologists took this call to heart, and much recent work on the Andes has indeed centered on working-class and rural peoples’ protest, political work, and revolution. Scholars such as Forrest Hylton and Sinclair Thomson highlight the “revolutionary spirit” of indigenous and mestizo Bolivians. Indeed, strong movements opposing neoliberal economic policies and multinational corporations’ ownership of many of Bolivia’s natural resources have been politically effective. One of the most heightened moments of this movement was the inauguration of Evo Morales, Bolivia’s (and the hemisphere’s) first indigenous president. In speeches celebrating his inauguration, Evo emphasized both his indigeneity and revolutionary ideology with statements such as “I say to you, my Indian brothers and sisters from America concentrated here in Bolivia, the 500 year campaign of resistance has not been in vain. This democratic, cultural fight is part of the fight of our ancestors; it is the continuity of the fight of Tupaj Katari, of Che Guevara.” In this small statement, he links himself and his supporters not only to leftist revolutions in Latin America of the last century, but also to a much longer lineage of anti-colonialism, anti-imperialism, and anti-exploitation that has existed since subaltern Bolivians resisted their colonial exploiters. Revolution then is not something that happened in the past, but something that is the continuity between “then” and “now.”




These historical revolutions penetrate many citizens’ understandings of “Bolivianness” today. When I arrived in La Paz for the first time in July 2009, I did so on the eve of the annual celebration Día de La Paz. All over the city banners were hung in celebration of “200 Años Libre.” In 1809 several uprisings against royalist forces began in La Paz. Though insurgent troops did not succeed in a decisive victory over Spanish forces until 1825, it is the beginning of the campaign that is remembered as the year of freedom. On July 16, 1809 Pedro Domingo Murillo famously declared that the Bolivia revolution was igniting a fire that no one could put out. Though Murillo was hung in the Plaza de los Españoles that night, the plaza was renamed for him and he is remembered as a voice of the revolution. In 2009 banners around La Paz proclaimed, “Somos un fuego qué no se apaga!” [We are a fire that cannot be extinguished].

And so, to me, Bolivia lived up to its reputation as a hotbed of revolution. I had always (though self-consciously) romanticized Bolivian revolution a bit. [I've also written about Bolivian protest here and here]. I was continually impressed by the ways miners, teachers, and health workers could simply block off a road could and force the president into negotiations for salary increases, as had happened a few weeks after I arrived in La Paz in April 2011. I was awestruck at the “revolutionary pride” Hylton and Thomson had described, and always wondered why Bolivians were so effective at protest, while people in the US just seemed totally incapable.

Well, now, perhaps, times…they are a’changin…




Occupy Wall Street is now almost a month old, and cities like Boston, Chicago, Philly, and Madison, and Minneapolis, (and of course my beloved DC's Occupy K Street) have similar occupations afoot. I’m still my cynical self and despite my semi-sporadic presence at DC General Assembly meetings, I’m not 100% convinced the REVOLUTION is immanent. I’d still consider myself hopeful though.

I’ve been taking fieldnotes on what I’ve experienced. I guess its just habit these days. But after reading a conference paper of mine on the representation [and/or imaginary] of Bolivian protest, my advisor suggested I develop it into a longer article for publication and incorporate some stuff on the Arab Spring and Occupy Movement. I’m still unsure if I will actually do that, but its made me think more critically about what is going on.




But here, I’m going to take time to comment on what to me has seemed the biggest debate associated with occupations: Specific Demands vs. Problematizing the Status Quo. From big news outlets such as the New York Times, and Wall Street Journal down to small scale political bloggers all emphasize the major weakness of the(se) movement(s) being a lack of specific demands. And much of the grassroots organizing communities (though certainly not all) have countered that essentially, it is not their job to write laws, and if the government had been doing their job all along, we wouldn’t be in this mess [I saw this summed up in a photo of a man with a sign at some occupation somewhere and now for the life of me can’t find the picture].

I’m still unsure where I fall in this debate. But the most cogent examination of this I’ve seen thus far has suggested we must “Turn the Shame Around.”

An unjust system’s first line of defense is shame. As long as we’re ashamed to admit that we’re victims, as long as we’re ashamed to identify with the other losers, we’re helpless.

It would be great to have a 10-point plan that solves everything. It would be great to have a party that endorses that plan and a get-out-the-vote movement to put that party into office. But none of that is going to happen until large numbers of us cast off our shame, until we turn the shame around: We need to stop being ashamed that we couldn’t crack the top 1%, and instead cast shame on an economic system that only works for 1%. The people who defend that immoral system and profit from it — they should be ashamed, not us.

He compares this movement to those of LGBT rights and Feminism, suggesting that before specific aims can be approached, a politics of visibility must emerge. He of course links to We are the 99%, which may be considered the first (or at least best publicized) online repository of shame shifting. [see also Matt Taibbi’s piece on Common Dreams]

He concludes

The old rules still apply. We’re going to need policies. We’re going to need agendas and lists of demands. We’re going to need leaders to represent us and armies of volunteers to knock on doors and make phone calls and write letters to the editor. We’re going to have to register millions of voters and get them to the polls. None of that is going to happen automatically just because people lose their shame about being victims of an economy run by and for the 1%.

But I don’t believe that stuff is going to happen at all — not on the scale we need — until people lose their shame about being victims and losers. It’s just a first step, but I don’t think we can skip it.




And so, I bring us back to the materiality of representation. As Butler (1998) and Fraser (1997) famously (for nerds like me) hashed out, representation is not “merely cultural.” Representations carry material consequences. For the luchadoras, using the image of the chola not only exploits but also reproduces indigenous women’s vulnerability to physical and structural harm, at times furthing the cycle of violence and subordination. For Occupiers, representation either grants legitimacy, leading to increased attention and solidarity, or delegitimizes the movement as fringe. So, to use Spivak’s (1988) notion that representation may be conceived of in two senses, the “re-presentation” of a group deeply impacts their ability to be spoken for in political representation.

So, yes, we Occupiers must eventually demand specific actions. But given the states of visibility and representation at the moment, we must still work on building solidarity, and strength. If we narrow our demands too early, they will not be heard. At the moment, the Nation is Waiting for Protesters to Clearly Articulate Demands Before Ignoring Them.

see more of my pictures on J & M's "letter to an @narquista in the oven"

enfermedades

On Sunday afternoon, I set out in the early fall rain to say goodbye to a good friend. The weather had recently cooled, so I had to dig my thicker jacket out of a box in the closet. When I put it on, I found a 5 Boliviano coin in the pocket, smiling and sighing at once. The rain was more of a mist really. My lack of hood wasn’t a problem and my canvas converse shoes held the dampness out. But it was enough to reactivate the runny nose I’d been periodically fighting off for the last two weeks.

I walked up the slight hill about half a mile, listening to Velvet Underground on my ipod. Watching the passing cars splash through the wet road, and leaves waves as raindrops pushed them around put me in a slight trance. Before I knew it I was standing in front of the bar that had operated under at least 5 different names in the four years I had lived in the neighorhood. I walked in the door and found my group; JK3 and her husband, Futurama with two of her coworkers, and the Otto. The warmth of the bar coaxed even more goo from my nose and I sniffled to keep it in check.

I slid up between Otto and Futurama and put an arm on both of their shoulders. They hugged back and we exchanged hellos. In the midst I must have sniffled some more because Futurama asked if I had a cold. “Oh, just the same old runny nose as always,” I said.

And then it hit me. People here are not always sick.

I was doing fine in La Paz for about a week. Then the sniffles hit. Fortunately, for the most part, the kids in my shared dorm room were far more into the clandestine cocaine bar than sleeping at night, so my sniffles were mine alone, and caused minimal disturbance. Though the last night in the room, there was a guy next to me sleeping who had to catch a bus to the lake at 6:30 am. I know my snorting of nasal moisture woke him up a few times.

And then the intestinal problems hit. Nothing awful or urgent, but just a constant reminder that things are “not quite right” there. And annoying climbing down off a top bunk several times in the middle of the night. As Alex put it, I was fully convinced “I’ll never have a normal poo again.” But then eventually things got a little more normal.

And then I went to Cuzco. And then I had my evening of constant farts and burps, and eventual rash which convinced me that the hot pepper I had eaten earlier that day was eating through my stomach lining, and through the inner layers of my skin causing it to get red. Turns out it was just a parasite. And after 5 days of taking nasty pills and not drinking alcohol, it resolved itself.

Three days later I returned to La Paz with a cough in tow. The cough lasted approximately five weeks. I remember waking up in the middle of the night, in the staff room, unable to stop coughing. I felt bad, because these people did not all stay out til 7am at Route 36 every night. Some actually had to work at 7.

That eventually cleared up about a week before I left. Along the way I also had brief relapses of the intestinal problems, as well as sniffles again. I had a cut on my hand that took two days to stop bleeding. A burn on the side of my face (from a stick of incense) that I kept forgetting about and scratching the scab off. I saw three people hobble around after stepping on glass. In essence, my existence in Bolivia was a constant stream of malady.

And then I came back here, and developed a sore throat and sniffles. But never really thought about them as a problem. Just part of life. And then people like Futurama remind me that life can exist without constant disorder. Though strangely, this is the place where institutions and prices make getting medical care and remedies so much more difficult.

So as I walked back from the bar, after giving a last hug (at least for 6 months) to JK and the spouse, I sniffled some more. And again I was reminded of Bolivia. But this time not because of sickness. Instead, because saying goodbye was such a quotidian event there.