Doctoral Dissertation Research: Indigeneity, Social Movements, and Social Relations in South American Context

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This study will be conducted by University of Texas doctoral student Tathagatan Ravindran under the guidance of Dr. Charles Hale. This project explores how international discussions about indigeneity influence local social movements. The research is set in the Bolivian city of El Alto, which is an ideal locale for investigating globalization and indigenous social movements for a couple reasons. In addition to being the largest indigenous city in the Americas, it has also been at the center of multiple waves of mass popular mobilizations, particularly in the last decade. This research asks what these political mobilizations can tell social scientists about the nature of social relationships in ethnically diverse societies. Studies on El Alto in the 1980s and the 1990s revealed the existence of discrimination within the urban indigenous communities against recent rural immigrants who were seen to have more indigenous cultural traits. What influence then do indigenous political currents in the city have on discriminatory practices, political stability, and social relations? The research will be based on participant observation, interviews, and the collection of oral histories in two urban neighborhoods, which are both composed of rural migrants and have been active sites for indigenous social movements. The study will advance anthropological understandings of urban indigeneities, social movements and socioeconomic inequalities. In particular, the project will transform anthropological understandings about what accelerates social movements, and what their impact is on local social relations. In addition to training a graduate student, the study will also contribute to public policy attempts to address social conflict and their resolution.