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Accepted Paper:
The Politics of Motherhood and Care of the Kukama Kukamiria Women Facing a Pandemic in Toxic Environments
Roxana Vergara
(Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú)
This paper describes how Kukama Kukamiria women politicized their motherhood and care labor actions to question the inadequacy of State policies, putting ties and care between humans and non-human beings in the center of their practices for surviving the pandemic after several oil spills.
Paper long abstract:
Indigenous people and women were significantly affected by the Covid-19 pandemic in Amazon countries. The intercultural health policies arrived late without correspondence to specific needs and were vectors of contagion. In places where hydrocarbon concessions overlap with indigenous territories, the situation was even worst. Decades of oil pollution have deteriorated the environment and the health of indigenous communities. Despite this, indigenous people have organized themselves and taken measures to care for and protect themselves. This paper describes how Kukama Kukamiria women in the lower basin of the Marañón River in the Peruvian Amazon, especially in the Cuninico community, politicized their motherhood and care labor to question the inadequacy of State policies in toxic environments.
Women first organized themselves like “Kukama mothers” or “native mothers” in different organizations to survive the severe damage caused by an oil spill in 2014. Their organization corresponds to women's role of care for children and family members in their communities: feeding and healing are attributes for conviviality. During the pandemic, mothers cared for others based on previous experiences, the knowledge of the grandmothers, and the power of a non-human being, the “mother” of the plants that live in the Amazon forest. They also participate in national public spaces to share their family and community experiences and critics the policies of care and health, putting ties and caring between humans and non-human beings in the center of their actions and claims.