Paper short abstract:

My ethnographic work in three sites in Peru--an indigenous community, a highland city, and the migrant stream to Lima--seeks to decolonize knowledge regarding the intersection of gender and race in the Andean region. This paper traces my approach for advancing a decolonial feminist anthropology.

Paper long abstract:

In Andean Peru, ambivalence related to individuals' geographic and social origins results in deeply contradictory attitudes and practices that can be understood only if we decolonize our thinking about what it is to be Andean. My feminist reexamination of racial and gender inequalities as well as other enduring injustices in Peru will offer insights into questions of inclusion and exclusion, national belonging, and citizenship in the Andean region. Historically, there has been great social and economic interdependence across various zones of the Peruvian Andes. Today, social standing is often measured in inverse proportion to the altitude of one's origins, with Lima at sea level holding the greatest prestige. The paradoxes of perceived differences whereby Andeans frequently will assert that those who are "more Indian" or "authentically Andean" live "más arriba" or higher up are on wide display. When Andeans migrate to nearby cities or to the urban coast, they often "upgrade" their status by claiming to be from somewhere other than their rural home. They may reject ethnic labels for themselves just as they project them on others, in an effort to show they belong in a society that often shuns them. At the same time, national-level desires to embrace Andean cultural heritage are in dramatic evidence as Peru builds its "brand" for global consumption. Ambivalent racial and gendered practices in three diverse research locations are the threads I trace in this paper as I seek to advance a decolonial feminist anthropology.