Guatemala

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From Left to Rights is study of a social movement mobilized in the new age of rights—Guatemalan women’s organizations’ campaign to eradicate violence against women. The movement relies on and derives from women’s human rights discourse and the transnational feminist movement, yet it is a local manifestation of a search for justice, dignity and hope. The main protagonists of this campaign are Guatemalan women who have decided, for historic and strategic reasons, to use women’s human rights discourse to promote their struggle. Considering some of the discourse’s internal contradictions, and based on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Guatemala City, I argue that in order for women’s human rights discourse to promote a substantial change in the lives of Guatemalans, the discourse is framed and practiced in terms of dignity.
As I illustrate, Guatemalan women’s organizations emphasize and legitimize women’s diverse lived experiences. They encourage women to see themselves as worthy beings, as actors, and as the rightful protagonists of their own lives. They also motivate women to draw support from other women and to see themselves as part of a worthy community. Hence, these organizations inspire women to begin to imagine themselves not only as worthy of life, but also as worthy of happiness. In a reality in which envisioning change is an act of resistance, hope—the ability to imagine a better future—is the key mechanism to explain the social transformation attempted by Guatemala’s women’s rights campaign. Such individual and collective transformation further requires transforming the spaces in which they live to allow and encourage these new subjectivities. This dual, dialectical transition, I illustrate, is both an outcome of a long process, and a method to keep the (transformation) process going.

While many scholars and activists from various disciplines have reported on various aspects of orphan policy and the international adoption industry, there has been little synthesis of this information and its implications for global child protection. This chapter therefore puts the pieces together to argue that the misidentification of ‘orphans’ as a category for development and humanitarian intervention has subsequently been misappropriated by many Western individuals and charitable organizations. Promoting a discourse of orphan rescue, they foster the growth of an ‘orphan industrial complex.’ In developing countries like Guatemala and Uganda whose children are targeted for ‘rescue,’ the discourse and practice of ‘orphan rescue’ is subsequently jeopardizing child protection and even driving the ‘production’ of orphans as objects for particular kinds of intervention counter to established international standards of child protection.

This study evaluates population variation of eight cranial morphoscopic traits using samples of known Southwest Hispanics (n=72), Guatemalans (n=10 6), American Blacks (n=146), and
American Whites (n=218). We applied the support vector machine (SVM) method to build a prediction model based on a sub-sample (20%) of the data; the remainder of the data was used as a test sample. The SVM approach effectively differentiated between the four groups with correct classification rates between 72% (Guatemalan group) and 94% (American Black group). However, when the  Guatemalan and Southwest Hispanic samples were pooled, the same model correctly classified all groups with a higher degree of accuracy (American Black = 96%; American White = 77%; and the pooled Hispanic sample = 91%). This study also identified significant differences between the two Hispanic groups in six of the eight traits using univariate statistical tests. These results speak to the unique population histories of these samples and the current use of the term ‘Hispanic’ within forensic anthropology. Finally, we argue that the SVM can be used as a classification model for ancestry estimation in a forensic context and, as a diagnostic tool may broaden the application of morphoscopic trait data for the assessment of ancestry.

En medio de la reestructuración neoliberal y un proyecto de la reforma agraria asistida por el mercado (MLAR, por sus siglas en ingles), las comunidades rurales guatemaltecas y las organizaciones campesinas han luchado para acceder, recuperar, o mantener la tierra comunal a través de la acción directa. Este ensayo explora las dinámicas de la lucha agraria organizada en la Guatemala contemporánea, argumentando que tres formas de organización que han sido llamadas oficialmente como “conflictos agrarios”—derechos históricos, derechos laborales, y ocupaciones de fincas—juntas representan más acceso a la tierra por parte de los campesinos que la que ha sido otorgada a través del sistema del MLAR. También se debate sobre de la dificultad de escapar del modelo neoliberal, y el ensayo concluye que incluso las campanas de base más exitosas por la tierra han contribuido a la aplicación de la reestructuración neoliberal.

A presente obra, produto direto do Seminário Internacional 'Limites
e Possibilidades da Justiça de Transição: impunidade, direitos e democracia', realizado em abril de 2012, em Porto Alegre, pelo Grupo de Pesquisa Direito à Verdade e à Memória e Justiça de Transição, com
sede na Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul, e pela Comissão de Anistia do Ministério da Justiça, com apoio do Programa das Nações Unidas para o Desenvolvimento (PNUD), da Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento do Pessoal do Ensino Superior (CAPES), do Conselho Nacional de Pesquisa (CNPq), da Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul (FAPERGS) e da Pró-Reitoria de Extensão da Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), procura registrar diferentes olhares disciplinares sobre as inovações e os desafios produzidos nas Américas em seus processos de construção e consolidação democrática. A partir de diferentes olhares, os artigos que compõem este livro encontram-se no olhar das vítimas como fundamento e ponto de partida, para, assim, enfrentar o legado do passado autoritário de maneira a garantir e efetivar direitos humanos.

The hieroglyphic text on Stela 1 of El Baul, which includes an Initial Series date in the year 36 AD, is the key to understanding the early development of writing in South Preclassic Mesoamerica and the cultural history of the South Coast of Guatemala. However, little is known about the archaeological context of this important sculpture. Several decades ago it was removed from its original location in front of the Structure 21, one of the most important buildings of El Baul, which also originally housed Stela 27 and the Monument 14 (the Great Jaguar of El Baul). In recent years, the structure was partially destroyed as a result of agricultural activities on the site. During the 2010-2011 Cotzumalguapa Archaeological Project’s field season, excavations were conducted in this structure, in order to document the architecture and stratigraphy. A primary objective was to determine the presence or absence of constructive strata of Late Preclassic period, contemporary with Stela 1. This paper describes the results of this research, which allowed us partially constructive history and architectural features of the building. The excavation also produced several findings of interest to the study of ritual activities that took place around the structure and extraordinary monuments that stood in their environment.

This paper presents information on the destruction of archaeological remains at the site of El Baúl and the Cotzumalguapa region. Agriculture and other activities in the area have contributed to the destruction. New findings will be presented on the discovery of new causeways and the use of prehispanic bridges. The rescue and protection of Monument 69 from El Baul will be presented.

This article reviews media coverage of the much-hyped end of a cycle in the Maya Long Count Calendar in December of 2012, focusing on the efforts of different indigenous and non-indigenous agents in Guatemala and beyond to claim its meaning. I note a convergence between Maya and New Age interpretations of the transcendental significance of the date, though argue that the relevance of boundaries between Maya and others varied in terms of the position (local, national and transnational) of key players. This highlights challenges facing contemporary Maya Spirituality as it enters transnational circuits, particularly in terms of establishing religious authority. [Maya Calendar; Guatemala; Maya Spirituality; Ethnicity; Transnationalism; Religious Revitalization]

Boletín AFEHC N°60, publicado el 04 marzo 2014
El objetivo de este artículo es evidenciar el uso sistemático de las mujeres trabajadoras del sexo como herramientas y auxiliares del proceso de inoculación a guatemaltecos entre 1946 y 1948. Sin que se contara con el consentimiento informado de las personas consideradas en los estudios realizados por médicos guatemaltecos y norteamericanos, con el objeto de estudiar la penicilina como recurso para curar la sífilis y la gonorrea.
Disponible:  http://www.afehc-historia-centroamericana.org/index.php?action=fi_aff&id=3663

For many years, the “Day Keepers,” or religious specialists of the highland Guatemalan town of Momostenango have been the focus of scholarly investigation due to their lasting commitment to traditionalism and adherence to the 260-day pre-Hispanic calendar and attendant rituals. However, another aspect of Momostenango society is its widespread interest in and reception of North American mass media and popular culture. This paper explores disfraces, “disguises,” a new genre of dances performed during the annual festival dedicated to the patron saint of the community, Santiago. These dances emphasize cultural change and innovation by featuring costumes derived from the US, such as Eddie Murphy, Batman, Harry Potter, and even Barack Obama. In this way, disfraces function as a strategy for managing and conceptualizing the effects of globalization. This paper examines one costume in particular, Xena, Warrior Princess, and explore how it is being used to produce local meaning for women, an emerging group of performers previously excluded from public dance presentations. Among the K’iche’ Maya of Momostenango today, gender roles are in the process of shifting as women take on innovative ways of engaging society at large and make use of a format once considered appropriate only for men. This paper looks at the multiple ways in which Xena “disguises” and performances operate as a site for the production of identity, signifying specific notions of gender and femininity and women’s place in post-war Guatemala.