Privatizing the Tzuultaq'a?. Private property and spiritual reproduction in post-war Guatemala

This study considers how Guatemalan genocide survivors mediate their identities through property relations on a former development pole, or strategic hamlet built on the ashes of a scorched earth massacre. It traces the historical trajectory of a lowlands Q'eqchi' community's land tenure, from a land conflict with a plantation owner that sparked a military massacre to their resettlement under army auspices. I conclude that the community did not choose to privatize their land titles because they joined up with a neoliberal project. Rather, they used individualized titles as a strategy to ward off violent dispossession. Further, the study argues that spiritual leaders explained their decision to leave sacred sites unmarked on the grid of private titles as a means of protection. Today, the community as a collective renews their spiritual relationship with the hill-valley spirit and seeks permission to plant on private property. eng

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