Highland Indians and the State in Modern Ecuador, edited by A. Kim Clark and Marc Becker, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007, 348 pp., $39.95 hardcover
This collection of essays challenges common misconceptions about Ecuador’s indigenous peoples, demonstrating that they have effectively engaged the state since the early 19th century. Counteracting “the impression that this relationship barely existed until quite recently,” the book also emphasizes that Ecuador has been and continues to be not only a hot spot for indigenous political movements, but also for their involvement in state formation itself. Rather than maintaining autonomy and distance from state apparatuses, as in other Latin American countries, Ecuador’s indigenous peoples directly involved themselves in implementing policies and forming new institutions.
Three themes link the 14 essays, including the state’s intervention in indigenous affairs (that is, projects developed from the top down); state formation from below through indigenous activism, which often brought the state into marginalized areas; and the inconsistencies and contradictions in the state’s dealings with local communities. The essays range in historical perspective and regional outlook, but collectively argue that indigenous involvement was a crucial component of Ecuadoran state formation. Although the book focuses on highland Ecuador, four of the essays offer insightful comparisons with Peru, Mexico, Bolivia, and the Ecuadoran Amazon.
Unsettling Accounts: Neither Truth nor Reconciliation in Confessions of State Violence, by Leigh A. Payne, Duke University Press, 2008, 374 pp., $23.95 paperback
This exploration into confessions of state violence in post-authoritarian Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and South Africa illuminates how such confessions do not necessarily produce “truth” or “reconciliation.” Approaching confession as performance, Payne analyzes a wide variety of confessions that include expressions of remorse, denial, sadism, and amnesia. In every case, however, Payne resists the temptation to consider “confession” a panacea for democracy building. Rather, she argues that the truth revealed in confession opens up space for debate.
The openness of the debate, according to Payne, is the key, as the interpretations of events given by various actors (survivors, perpetrators, collaborators) make their way into discourse and debate, largely through media portrayals and other “factors external to the perpetrators’ confessional speech,” including “institutional mechanisms (staging), political context (timing), and public response (audience),” which “also shape the power of unsettling accounts to stimulate debate and engender political change.” But this unsettling encounter with confession and debates on the legitimacy of interpretation are positive forces for democratic ideals and open dialogue, she argues, even if they unsettle the ground upon which democratic principles have been built. Payne concludes the book by analyzing the infamous Abu Ghraib photos and the ensuing political debates in the U.S. media.
The Hidden History of Capoeira: A Collision of Cultures in the Brazilian Battle Dance, by Maya Talmon-Chvaicer, University of Texas Press, 2008, 237 pp., $24.95 paperback
What is capoeira? For both those who practice “the Brazilian battle dance” and those who have never heard of it, The Hidden History of Capoeira offers thoroughly researched answers to the question. This rich analysis takes the form of both a socio-historical and cultural study of the “encounters, collisions, and fusion” that shaped the popular art. Drawing on mostly 19th-century primary documents and ethnographic research, Talmon-Chvaicer tells capoeira’s “hidden history,” tracing its uncertain origins to African and African-Brazilian peoples (with especially strong influence from Kongolese and Yorubans) and their incorporation of Catholic Portuguese influences.
Each chapter is broken into two sections: The first examines capoeira from the perspective of Europeans and their descendants or the dominant class; the second, from the perspective of those on the margin who were more likely involved with the “game of life,” as it was known, covering its subversive, covert aspects and the African influences that “were hidden, repressed, misunderstood, or underestimated by Europeans and their descendants.” The author also analyzes the contemporary use that has been made of capoeira in the attempt to construct a generic Brazilian identity, while also discussing the global popularity of this dance/martial art among middle- and upper-class young people.
