Cremers, G.

English

This dissertation explores how social and natural landscapes in Guatemala's Western Highlands become meaningful by examining how different vectors of globalization inform and challenge how a diverse group of actors, such as residents and tourists, navigate environments in which processes of transformation play a central role. It unpacks how such processes of globalization are manifested through, for example, tourism (in all its guises), infrastructure development, and imaginaries of cosmopolitan or cosmopolitical conditions. These manifestations are subsequently mediated by interactions that take place within landscapes and are simultaneously shaped and reconstructed by these landscapes. Examining these processes of globalization on a local level shows how these should not be seen as separate developments per se, but rather as related and processual phenomena. Particularly, it unveils the importance of looking into local-global encounters within their specific contexts and highlights how transforming landscapes in Guatemala are negotiated and contested. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Guatemala’s Western Highlands, I suggest new ways of understanding landscapes as global connectors that underline lived experiences and everyday encounters, rather than evaluating general processes of globalization as a central focus of study. As such, this dissertation proposes a point of departure for thinking about territorial narratives and imaginaries and, consequently, the construction of social and natural landscapes in a more nuanced way to reconsider how socio-environmental relations and worldly engagements play out in people’s everyday realities

International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion online publications

UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (https://dare.uva.nl)UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository)Voices from the landscapeNarrating and imagining local-global encounters in Guatemala's Western HighlandsCremers, G.Publication date2022Link to publicationCitation for published version (APA):Cremers, G. (2022). Voices from the landscape: Narrating and imagining local-globalencounters in Guatemala's Western Highlands. [Thesis, externally prepared, Universiteit vanAmsterdam].General rightsIt is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s)and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an opencontent license (like Creative Commons).Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, pleaselet the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the materialinaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letterto: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Youwill be contacted as soon as possible.Download date:10 Mar 2023VOICES FROM THE LANDSCAPE                                  GIJS CREMERS<TITEL><evt. ondertitel><naam klant>Voices from the LandscapeGijs Cremers158326_Cremers_R11,5_OMS.indd   2-3 28-03-2022   14:33         VOICES FROM THE LANDSCAPE  Narrating and Imagining Local-Global Encounters in Guatemala’s Western Highlands                 Gijs Cremers       Voices from the Landscape: Narrating and Imagining Local-Global Encounters in Guatemala’s Western Highlands  © Gijs Cremers, 2022 ISBN: 978-94-6458-199-7Cover art: Lisan Cremers-Brekelmans & Gijs CremersAll photos, maps, and drawings: Gijs Cremers Printed by Ridderprint | www.ridderprint.nl Voices from the Landscape     Narrating and Imagining Local-Global Encounters in Guatemala's Western Highlands   ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor  aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam  op gezag van de Rector Magnificus  prof. dr. ir. K.I.J. Maex ten overstaan van een door het College voor Promoties ingestelde commissie, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel  op dinsdag 31 mei 2022, te 12.00 uur door Gijs Cremers  geboren te Eindhoven    Promotiecommissie  Promotor: prof. dr. C.G. Koonings    Universiteit van Amsterdam Copromotor: dr. E.D. Rasch    Wageningen University & Research Overige leden: prof. dr. B.B. Hogenboom Universiteit van Amsterdam  prof. dr. R.A. Boelens Universiteit van Amsterdam  prof. dr. E.F. Fischer Vanderbilt University  prof. dr. W.G. Pansters Universiteit Utrecht  dr. J.L. Ypeij Universiteit van Amsterdam  dr. M. Glebbeek Universiteit Utrecht    Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen                            Muchas gracias a todxs.  Matyox – puro ütz, siempre n’xuk’uk.              Het hier beschreven onderzoek werd mede mogelijk gemaakt door steun van de Prince Bernhard Scholarship 2014 (€ 5,000.00), uitgereikt door het Centre for Latin American Research and Documentation (CEDLA) aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam.          i     TABLE OF CONTENTS  List of Figures          iii Maps            iv Acknowledgements          vi 1. Introduction          1  La Tierra se Defiende         1 Theoretical Underpinnings        5 Rationale          12 Research Context         16 Glimpses of Worlds Told and Untold       18 Fieldwork in the Western Highlands       26 Dissertation Outline         34 2. ‘El Dios Dinero es El que Manda’: Nature as a Field of Force in the Western  Highlands of Guatemala         37 Introduction          38 Nature as a Field of Force        39 Guatemala’s Highlands and Massive Resource Extraction, the Globalization   of Rights and Expanding Ecotourism      41 Nature as a Source for Large-Scale (Neoliberal) Development   44 Nature as Territory         47 Nature as a Cultural and Ecological Tourist Destination    50 Conclusion          55 3. Paradise Glossed: Tourism Imaginaries, Alienation, and the Construction of Landscape in Santa Cruz la Laguna, Guatemala      57 Introduction          58 Tourism Imaginaries and Alienation       61 Contextualizing the Tourism Landscape in Santa Cruz la Laguna   63 Imagining a Paradisiacal Landscape: Tropical Encounters, Souvenirs  and Mayas          66 Being in Paradise: The Performative Resonance of Alienation   71 Conclusion          74 4. On Everyday Natures and Enchanted Landscapes: Worldmaking Practices and  Rooted Cosmopolitanism in Guatemala’s Western Highlands Highlands  77  Introduction          78  Cosmopolitanism and Tourism       80 Contextualising Human-Environment Relations in the Western Highlands  82  Becoming Cosmopolitan by the ‘Sweet fountain of life’    85  Cosmopolitan Engagements in ‘Paradise’       90  Conclusion          98  ii   5. (Un)Paved Junctions: Navigating the Progression of a Road-Building Project  in Santa Cruz la Laguna, Guatemala       101  Introduction          102  Landscape and Infrastructures       104  Looking Back at Road Development in Guatemala     106  Imagining Uncertainties through Road Construction     109  Moving Forward: Articulating Narratives of Hope     114  Conclusion          117 6. Coda           119  Frictional Encounters         123  A Brief Note on Limitations        125 Bibliography           126 Appendices             Summary          144  Samenvatting          147  Resumen          151  List of Publications included in this Dissertation      155                Please note: Chapters 2–5 have been published or accepted as peer reviewed research articles. Minor format and style changes were made for consistency reasons. Spelling remains in accordance with the respective journal guidelines. References should be made to the original articles (see chapter pages and List of Publications).  iii  LIST OF FIGURES   Figure 1.  Sinkhole in the 10a Calle, Quetzaltenango.     3 Figure 2.  La lucha sigue; la tierra se defiende.      3 Figure 3.  Fieldnote drawing, Chicabal.        19 Figure 4.  Crater lake under a layer of mist.       21 Figure 5.  Ceremonial leftovers.         21 Figure 6.  Fieldnote drawing, Santa Cruz la Laguna.      22 Figure 7.  Wooden figures.         23 Figure 8.  Mural: donde está el pato poc .      26 Figure 9.  Communal gathering.         26 Figure 10.  Hostel pathways.        67 Figure 11.  ‘Maya’ sculpture.        67 Figure 12.  Altar Maya on the banks of Laguna de Chicabal.     87 Figure 13.  Ajq’ij performing a ceremony.       87 Figure 14.  Nahual calculation.         89 Figure 15.  Tattooed nahual symbol.        89 Figure 16.  Arrival by lancha, 2018.        92 Figure 17.  Mural in Santa Cruz.         94 Figure 18.  Mural in Santa Cruz.         94 Figure 19.  Map of the northern Lake Atitlán Region indicating the East–West    trajectory of the Pan-American Highway (CA 1) and the  Santa Cruz road.         107 Figure 20.  Landslide in the Pasiwán Valley.      110 Figure 21.  ‘New’ cars lining the main road between the dock and the centre.  115 Figure 22.  The road entering Santa Cruz’s built environment.    115     iv  MAPS   Map 1. Map of Guatemala and the Western Highlands Map 2. Locations of Lake Atitlán, Quetzaltenango, Chicabal, and the Pan-American Highway trajectory  v     Map 4. Streetplan of Santa Cruz la Laguna Map 3. Quetzaltenango, San Martín Sacatepéquez, and Chicabal  vi  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS  This research project never would have come to completion without the continuing support of many friends, family, colleagues, and supervisors. The route towards the dissertation as it lies before you has known great heights and deep lows. The past two years, since March 2020 in particular, have not always been easy. The days on which I regularly locked myself in my kitchen slash home office were characterised in no particular order by reading, writing, thinking, worrying, and reflecting – repeat. I'm glad I didn't have to go through this all by myself.  This dissertation would not have existed without the support of my promotor Dr. Kees Koonings and co-promotor Dr. Elisabet Rasch. Kees, thank you for sharing your insights and endless knowledge. There have been many moments when I thought to have lost control, and every single time you were there to keep me calm and make me see how easy it can be to not think overly complicated. Thank you for being an indispensable crisis hotline in many ways and for helping me enjoy the process of academic writing! Elisabet, it seems impossible to describe within the limited space of these acknowledgements how grateful I am for your supervision and friendship. Your meticulous readings of my texts and your guidance in every right direction have been tremendously helpful and kept challenging me methodologically and theoretically time and again. Thank you for taking me in as a student, for always pushing me to think beyond what I thought was already a great idea, for making me laugh and for cheering me up, for your unswerving passion and enthusiasm for anthropology, for the innumerable cups of coffee at Springhaver and only slightly more numerable drinks on the Riverhaven porch. Thank you, above all, for being an amazing friend and colleague, and for being the most unpretentious, inspirational, and skilled scholar I know – you rock and you roll! In the past couple of years, I have enjoyed the absolute privilege of doing fieldwork in Guatemala. I feel blessed that I have been given this opportunity. During this time, I got to know so many great people. It goes without saying that you have built the foundation of this dissertation. Without your help, contribution, friendliness, and openness, all that is written here would have never existed on paper. This is to my beloved Guatemala and all the people who have directly or indirectly contributed to this work, to all of those who have generously opened their homes and their minds to me. In particular I am very much indebted to Waldemar and Jessie (& little Keean!), Edgar (for the world's best pancakes on a bed of lettuce), Byron, Juan Carlos, Santiago, Estela, Etelvina, Manuel, Andrés, Rocael, Pilar, Juan, Miguel, Jose, Kristian,  vii  Jessica, Norma, Ronnaldo, the amazing staff at Xela’s Black Cat hostel, María Mercedes, Celia, Hilda, Olga, Glenda, Fabio, don Jordan and doña Julieta, Adita, Dave and Deedle, Alex, Alfonso, Anna, Jena, Hannah and Oliver (♥), Suzi, and, of course, mis amigos Cristian, Angél, Santos, and Antonio. Muchxs amigxs aparecen en esta tesis con pseudónimos, les agradezco muchísimo por su amistad y por permitirme realizar este estudio. ¡Matyox, maltiox, gracias – thanks for sharing your lives and thoughts with me! I’m especially indebted to Waldemar, Rocael, and Pilar. Thank you so much for hosting me, letting me tag along, and for always being there. Your friendship means the world to me.  I want to acknowledge the staff and faculty of the Department of Cultural Anthropology at Utrecht University for the great work they do. I’ve been given the opportunity to combine teaching with fieldwork, for which my specific thanks go to Kootje Willemse, Mari Mar Azofra, and Babs van den Born. Thank you for providing me with a proper desk, for always thinking along, and for helping me untangle the enigmatic logistics behind teaching. I will forever be thankful to Gerdien Steenbeek for sparking my love of anthropology in Chichicastenango in 2008. Thank you, Yvon van der Pijl, for being a brilliant colleague and close friend. Marie-Louise Glebbeek, I hope we will soon be able to hit the Pan-American Highway again. I would like to show gratitude all the other colleagues the department who I’ve worked with on a daily basis. Thank you for sharing your expertise and insights and for creating such a pleasant working environment. Wil Pansters, Tessa Diphoorn, Nikkie Wiegink, Martijn Oosterbaan, Hans de Kruijf, Fabiola Jara Gomez, Diederick Raven, David Henig, and Deana Jovanović, it has been a pleasure sharing lunches and discussions with you! Also, thank you to every other member or former member of the department: Aditi, Ahlam, Danse, Dirk, Donja, Geert, Hayal, Joost, Kyra, Lotje, Mariske, Marlene, Nine, Sabine, Ton, Willy. I am indebted to all of you, including those I may forget to mention.  Dissertation writing often seems like a never-ending story, the frequent discussions and conversations with my PhD colleagues at Utrecht University have been comforting and encouraging. I have enjoyed all the insightful debates and borrels a lot! Thank you Annemiek, Coco, Elke, Evi, Ivana, Jolien, Kathrine, Lotje, Merel, Nicole, Sara, Sofie, Sterre, Vinzenz, and Yke. I also highly appreciate everyone in the Guatemala Reading Group, thanks Elisabet, Evi, Marie-Louise, and Timo. We should definitely plan another post-pandemic gathering soon! I very much appreciate the spirited people at Etnofoor: Annemiek, Else, Erella, Eva, Lex, Luuk, Nikki, Tessa, Thijs, Vinzenz. Always looking forward to the next meeting! Then, I would like to thank my closest friends. All dinners, drinks, hikes and walks, game nights, endless days in the sun, brief holidays, and other leisure trips have brought me so  viii  much joy. Thanks, Yke and Vinzenz, my paranymphs, who have been incredible friends and have supported me through thick and thin. Johan en Joris, due to obvious circumstances, we haven’t seen each other as much as I would have liked over the past years. Fortunately, we will finally be able to plan new ‘Ekko-avondjes’ soon! Lotte and Jonas (and little Abel), thanks for being amazing friends. I will never forget the time we spent in the sparkling village of Hellenthal and the vibrant town of Laifour. Let’s never play Risk again. Kamé and Murtah (and little Ezra), thank you for the all the dinner parties and extensive conversations about the oddities of working in academia. Yke and Stephan (and little …), I’m glad that we got to share so many moments of joy throughout the past years. I’m already looking forward to going fossil hunting again, to sitting for hours in the darkness and freezing cold of the French Alps only to catch a glimpse of some stray meteor, to those long days of cooking and eating and drinking and talking about the peculiarities of life. Ian, thanks for being a close friend and for your insightful comments on earlier versions of some of the chapters. I truly hope we get to run from imaginary bulls and nap amidst ruins on an uninhabited island again. Job, you are the best friend I could have ever wished for. Thank you for all the moments of laughter and joy and for those nights of endless philosophising about nothing in particular. On to the next 20 years of shatterproof friendship, maat! Same goes for you, Jochem. And thanks for always stealing my food when I look away for just a nanosecond.  Stijn and Marthe (♥), Luce and Sam, there are few words that can describe what I want to say here. And should there be adequate words at all, they would probably only take away the complexities of what I feel. There are so many stories that I treasure. Moments of morning and evening, of coffee or wine. Moments of travel and rest, of sleep or awake. Moments of an hour or a day, instants of forever. So many memories that will keep echoing into the present. So much wonderful yesterday that will always be today. This is for you.  Furthermore, thank you to all my close and extended family who have supported me for many years. Especially pa en ma, you have always given me full support in chasing my dreams and encouraged my each and every endeavor. It would have been impossible to get to this point without you. You have always inspired and unconditionally supported me to pursue curiosity. I could never have done this without you. Bram, bruurke, you have played an important role by always being interested in me or my work, I am convinced that part of this dissertation is rooted in the common interests that we shared in both the past and the present. Thank you for being you. And, of course, Femke. You have been extremely supportive, even when it required great effort in times of (academic) crisis. Thanks for reading everything I wrote. Your continuous encouragement is what kept me going. 

Voices from the landscape:Narrating and imagining local-global encounters in Guatemala's Western Highlands

https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/71757935/Front_matter.pdf

Voices from the landscape:Narrating and imagining local-global encounters in Guatemala's Western Highlands

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion online publications