Human Rights in the Maya Region

Pedro Pitarch is Professor of Anthropology at the Complutense University in Madrid. His books include Ch’ulel: una etnografÍa de las almas tzeltales.Shannon Speed is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of Rights in Rebellion: Indigenous Struggle and Human Rights in Chiapas and a co-editor of Dissident Women: Gender and Cultural Politics in Chiapas.XÓchitl Leyva Solano is a researcher and professor at the Centro de Investigaciones e Estudios Superiores en AntropologÍa Social (CIESAS) in Chiapas, MÉxico. She is the author of Poder y desarrollo regional and a co-editor of Encuentros Antropologicos: Power, Identity, and Mobility in Mexican Society.

• Abbreviations viiIntroduction / Shannon Speed and Xochitl Leyva Solano 1Part 1: Global Politics and Nation-States 1. Cultural Rights and Human Rights: A Social Science Perspective / Rodolfo Stavenhagen 272. Perspectives on the Politics of Human Rights in Guatemala / Robert M. Carmack 513. Legal Globalization and Human Rights: Constructing the Rule of Law in Postconflict Guatemala? / Rachel Sieder 67Part 2: Cultural Contentions 4. The Labyrinth of Translation: A Tzeltal Version of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights / Pedro Pitarch 915. Are Human Rights Destroying the Natural Balance of All Things? The Difficult Encounter between International Law and Community Law in Mayan Guatemala / Stener Ekern 1236. "Here It's Different": The Ch'orti' and Human Rights Training / JuliÁn LÓpez GarcÍa 1457. Indigenous Law and Gender Dialogues / Irma Otzoy 1718. Human Rights, Land Conflicts, and Memory of the Violence in the Ixil Country of Northern QuichÉ / David Stoll 187Part 3: Political Engagements 9. Global Discourses on the Local Terrain: Human Rights in Chiapas / Shannon Speed and Xochitl Leyva Solano 20710. Breaking the Reign of Silence: Ethnography of a Clandestine Cemetery / Victoria Sanford 23311. Rights of the Poor: Progressive Catholicism and Indigenous Resistance in Chiapas / Christine Kovic 25712. "Asumiendo Nuestra Propia Defensa": Resistance and the Red de Defensores Comunitarios in Chiapas / Shannon Speed and Alvaro Reyes 279Final Comments Making Rights Meaningful for Mayas: Reflections on Culture, Rights, and Power / Richard Ashby Wilson 305References 323Contributors 357Index 361

“The notion of ‘universal human rights’ has had a checkered career over the past sixty years. Touted by some as one of the most effective tools for the empowerment and liberation of women and the poor in the so-called third world, it is denounced by others as a self-serving cultural imposition on the part of the Western world. Human Rights in the Maya Region takes us well beyond these extreme positions. By focusing on an exemplary case-the diverse experiences of the Mayan peoples of Chiapas and Guatemala-and never belittling the existing power asymmetries or the complexities of cultural translation, this coherent and well-grounded volume enlightens us on the multiple ways in which local groups make effective use of rights discourses on the basis of their distinct conceptions of persons and the world. At a more general level, the volume offers a nuanced and compelling explanation of the conjunctures of culture, rights, and power that are at play whenever ‘rights’ are deployed anywhere in the world. The volume will be of great value to those interested in human rights, indigenous peoples, social movements, traditional law, and the cultural-political dynamics of globalization.”-Arturo Escobar, author of Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, Redes “This is an important book. It brings together in one place state-of-the-art pieces by the scholars and scholar-activists who have made-and are making-the Maya area, especially Chiapas and Guatemala, one of the leading regions in the world for the theory and practice of indigenous human rights advocacy.”-Jan Rus III, coeditor of Mayan Lives, Mayan Utopias: The Indigenous Peoples of Chiapas and the Zapatista Rebellion