“Indios”, “comunistas” y “guerrilleros”: miedos y memorias de la lucha por tierras en las tierras altas de Jujuy, Argentina

Abstract

In this work we analyze the ways in which struggles for land since the last decades of the 19th century in the highlands of the Andean province of Jujuy, Argentina, were portrayed in terms of “communist threat”. Estate tenants (arrenderos) were accussed of “communists” while defined as “indigenous” and “Indians” in land-demands situations. The accusation of communists was incorporated and later on re-signified by the arrenderos in different ways. We will see how this complex path of markings, accusations and stigmatizations intervened, in the long term, in the ethnogenesis observed in the region, particularly around the 1990’s.

Keywords

• Communism
• Struggles for land
• Indigenous communities
• Jujuy
• Argentina