'To Work Is to Transform the Land': Agricultural Labour, Personhood
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THE LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS AND POLITICAL SCIENCE ‘To work is to transform the land’: Agricultural labour, personhood and landscape in an Andean ayllu. Clara Miranda Sheild Johansson A thesis submitted to the Department of Anthropology of the London School of Economics for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, London, June 2013 1 Declaration I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the MPhil/PhD degree of the London School of Economics and Political Science is solely my own work other than where I have clearly indicated that it is the work of others (in which case the extent of any work carried out jointly by me and any other person is clearly identified in it). The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. Quotation from it is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. This thesis may not be reproduced without my prior written consent. I warrant that this authorisation does not, to the best of my belief, infringe the rights of any third party. I declare that my thesis consists of 97, 961 words. I can confirm that my thesis was copy edited for conventions of language, spelling and grammar by Alanna Cant, Kimberly Chong, Katharine Dow and Stuart Sheild. 2 Abstract This thesis analyses the central role of agricultural labour in the construction of personhood, landscape and work in an Andean ayllu. It is an ethnographic study based on fieldwork in a small subsistence farming village in the highlands of Bolivia. In employing a practice-led approach and emphasising everyday labour, ambiguity and the realities of history and political power play, rather than the ayllu’s ‘core characteristics’ of complementarity and communality, the thesis moves away from the structuralist approaches which have dominated this field of study. In this setting, agricultural activity, llank’ay, (to transform the land), fills and shapes the days and seasons throughout the year. Llank’ay goes beyond economistic definitions of ‘work’ to include leisure, politics and everyday practice: it is bound up with myths of cosmogony, notions of value, the power of the land and a basic belief in what it is to be a human. The thesis examines the importance of llank’ay through several prisms: the tasks of the agricultural year and how these are crucial to the development of personhood; the mediating role of llank’ay in claims to land and inter-village relationships of reciprocity; the effects of Protestant conversion and the role of llank’ay in sustaining an animate landscape; the intersection of llank’ay with other forms of work; migration and the outcomes of discontinuing llank’ay. I conclude that in this ayllu the practice of agricultural activity transforms people and land, creates belonging and communality and shapes the local concept of what labour is. It in turn creates the structures and limits within which people and land can be transformed. 3 To Mac and Edith 4 Table of contents Declaration.................................................................................................................... 2 Abstract.......................................................................................................................... 3 Table of contents......................................................................................................... 5 List of figures................................................................................................................ 8 Acknowledgements.................................................................................................... 9 Glossary and Language ...........................................................................................11 List of Acronyms........................................................................................................15 List of Characters ......................................................................................................17 Maps ..............................................................................................................................19 Chapter 1: Introduction – A local concept of work ........................................22 The Field Site: Bolívar and P'iya Qayma in ayllu Kirkiyawi .............................. 27 The ayllu and studying ‘indigenous people’............................................................. 37 Labour and the Andes........................................................................................................ 47 Ethnicity, race, class, indigeneity and runa-hood.................................................. 55 Fieldwork in the Andes ..................................................................................................... 63 Thesis outline ........................................................................................................................ 70 Chapter 2: A history of Kirkiyawi – National identity politics and the battles for land...........................................................................................................74 Ayllu Kirkiyawi and the Charka Federation............................................................. 76 Colonialism, Republicanism and Resistance............................................................ 82 The Revolution and Beyond............................................................................................ 88 Neo-Liberalism and the politics of identity.............................................................. 91 Broad social movements and the victory of Evo Morales .................................. 96 Conclusion: History and the Local............................................................................. 102 Chapter 3: P’iya Qayma – A lived in landscape; practice during an agricultural year .................................................................................................... 104 P'iya Qayma village – a named and temporalised landscape ........................ 105 5 The people of P’iya Qayma and the agricultural year ....................................... 110 Chuqhu, communal labour............................................................................................ 135 Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 143 Chapter 4: The practice of llank’ay – Runa-hood and access to land .... 145 Llank’ay and runa-hood................................................................................................. 146 Access and rights to land............................................................................................... 151 The oca theft – access through llank’ay and enduring connections ........... 163 Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 167 Chapter 5: ‘The mountain ate his heart’ – Protestant conversion and the vernacular landscape ........................................................................................... 169 P’iya Qayma and Baptism – motives for conversion ......................................... 172 Protestantism – a ‘uniquely destructive rupture’ or a complementary force?...................................................................................................................................... 180 Baptist practice in P’iya Qayma.................................................................................. 183 The killing of Don Facundo and presence of animate land............................. 194 The vernacular power of land ..................................................................................... 202 Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 206 Chapter 6: ‘Being a jilanqo is like ploughing a field – it is llank’ay’– The ayllu, the union and non-agricultural work.................................................. 209 Historical and political context................................................................................... 212 The rift between the union and ayllu, and Mallku Sabino Veizaga ............. 217 Llank’ay, and the conflation of the ayllu and the union ................................... 225 Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 237 Chapter 7: Q’ara people and q’ara land – The risks of migration.......... 239 History of movement....................................................................................................... 244 Leaving or staying behind: trends and motivations in seasonal or long-term migration.............................................................................................................................. 247 Q’ara people ........................................................................................................................ 258 Q’ara land ............................................................................................................................. 270 6 Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 272 Chapter 8: Conclusion – The value of llank’ayError! Bookmark not defined. Epilogue .................................................................................................................... 275 Bibliography...........................................................................................................