Creole Neighborhood or Miskito Community?; A Case Study of Identity Politics in a Mosquito Coast Land Dispute

• Autores: Baron L. Pineda
• Localización: Journal of Latin American Anthropology, ISSN 1085-7052, Vol. 6, Nº. 1, 2001, págs. 120-155
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This article represents a case study that illustrates the ways in which the oral traditions of the Mosquito Coast region of Nicaragua, particularly those related to the foundation of the city of Bilwi/Puerto Cabezas, enter into a land dispute that occurred shortly after the electoral defeat of the Sandinista government. An understanding of the details of this dispute that takes place in a period in In which the controversy surrounding ethnic and indigenous identification had receded from its high point in the 1980s, provides insight into the nature of identity politics in the region. Although the case ostensibly concerns a modem land dispute with relatively low stakes, it clearly exposes a broad range of crosscutting contradictions and cleavages within Mosquito Coast and Nicaraguan society. The argument developed here focuses on the importance of incorporating regional and other non-ethnic units of analysis in the undeistanding of ethnic conflict