Producing the Indian: an ethnography of the indigenous category from the points of view Nahua and Tupinambás

Abstract

The current research is a continuation of a longstanding research, which is currently developing a comparative study between the cases studied before (Mejía, 2008, 2012) of the Ayotitlán's Nahua, Mexico , and Tupinambá of in Brazil which, on the argument of "assimilation" and "acculturation", no longer considered as indigenous. However, in the late twentieth century both collectives began a series of political processes in who claimed their right as indigenous people, movements that grew together with a narrative of his own trajectory transformation as indigenous people. Therefore, I intend during stay in Mexico, developing an exchange with Mexican anthropology about how this discipline has addressed these political processes, called indigenous emergencies. Likewise, I will develop a new field research and documentation focused on the last part of the political process of the Nahuas of Ayotitlán, deeper reflections on the one hand, the process in which they were uncharacterized as indigenous , and secondly, the process who achieved recognition as indigenous peoples. When it comes to research on the production of meaning and Nahuas Tupinambás give to what is "indigenous", delve in Mexico on production in the category encompassing context to investigate how the playing field on which is defined and must be that "other" indigenous in that country. Finally, as the emphasis of the research will be in production in Mexico than is the Nahua indigenous fieldwork will aim to generate an ethnographic results that show how the categories of otherness, of time, of respect, of the world, among other that determine the settings with which these indigenous dialogue with the larger scale under which achieved its recognition. (AU)