Julieta Flores-Muñoz, Marianne Sallum & Daniela Balanzátegui. Int J Histor Archaeol (2024)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10761-024-00765-3
ABSTRACT: Community-based archaeology has been reshaping the meaning of its praxis in Latin America. This is due to recognizing the importance of memory and active listening as sources of equal value to traditional archaeology methods and theories. Aligning archaeological practice with community knowledge and demands means integrating “affective alliances” in favor of collaboration, solidarity, and care. Inspired by Cusicanqui’s notion of equivalence, which advocates for traditional knowledge producers and interlocutors to engage in dialogue on equal terms, coming from different centers of thought, and by Barkin’s idea of a dialogue of knowledge, which proposes the development of projects designed from a local perspective, where inhabitants take the lead in the recovery and preservation of their own resources. This article presents two Latin American case studies that demonstrate the possibility of integrating content from the past and present through dialogues between the knowledge of community representatives and researchers. The first example is related to the traditional communities cultivating the Atlantic Forest on the coast of São Paulo, Brazil, whose ancestors were partially erased by colonial bureaucracy and academia but continue to articulate practices, identities, and materialities to persist. Another example is based on the research with the Nahua communities and the recuperation of their oral narratives, which, through cartograms and deep mapping, have contributed to recreating the various layers of experience that shaped household materiality in Mixtla de Altamirano, Mexico.
The materials and activities that built the rhythms of everyday life gave movement to the map and connected communities from the lowlands, middlelands and highland. In total, I visited 25 communities following the pathways illustrated in the map with footprints: seven in the highlands (in blue); 11 in the middlelands (in green); and seven in the lowlands (in red)