Born indigenous, growing up mestizos: ethnic, national, & cultural

identity and schooling in Arequipa, Peru

Mariella I. Arredondo

Indiana University, Bloomington, IN marredon@indiana.edu

Guiding research questions

How do rural-urban newcomer youth of indigenous descent at one particular school express their identities and imagine their national social membership as Arequipeans in the context of intense educational efforts to create "intercultural and democratic” citizens on the one hand, while being imparted ideological lessons from school and their surrounding society that continue to promote the homogenization of a diverse population and the invisibilization of anything “ethnic” in the name of progress and democracy?

Scope of this chapter

What role do schools currently play in the citizenship formation of modern, democratic, rural-urban migrant of indigenous descent in Peru’s second largest populated city, Arequipa?

In this piece I examine the seeming hierarchical relationships between different ethnic/cultural/social groups in the city of Arequipa through the analysis of youths’ perceptions of the intersections between ethnicity, race, class and culture.

Revelation

My findings thus far reveal that Arequipa’s elite private schools, through different mechanisms, are legitimating and reinforcing discourses that continue to marginalize members of the indigenous population. Moreover, through the negation of migrants’ indigenous ancestry and their classification as cholos* upon arrival, elite mestizo urban residents further reinforce the validity of their prejudices. As long as indigenous people remain in their highland communities they pose no threat to Arequipa’s strong mestizo regional identity. However, their movement into the cities converts them into cholos, thereby transforming them into targets of discrimination and continuous subjugation.

*The term cholo has a long history in Peruvian identity politics and has meant different things at different times. In its more simple definition

is the mix of mestizo and indigenous cultural and ethnic identities, particularly as indigenous people move to urban spaces and begin to

acculturate into an urban Peruvian culture.

• Second largest Peruvian city (almost 1000000 pop.).

• Arequipa as a mestizo* city

• population explosion

• mutation of regional identity (more Andean than western)

• migration creates new social identities

• to date no documentation of schooling migrant youth population

*Mestizo refers to racial/ethnic mixing as a category

of identity. In the specific case of Arequipa this mixing occurred between Europeans and Natives populations.

Research site: The city of

Arequipa, Peru

Methodology (of larger work)

Ethnographic research tools • Participant observation

– VNV (public high school) – 3 private schools (unofficially)

• Field notes

• In-depth interviews

– Students – Parents – Teachers – Administrators – State bureaucrats

• “Free thinking exercise”

surveys – 83 private school – 300 public school

• Photo-voice – Vnv (public school) focal

students (19)

The main research site VNV public high

school

• Classroom observations (school year calendar)

• My role at the school: school photographer,

videographer, substitute teacher, friend.

• In depth interviews with 19 focal students

• Photovoice data gathering with 19 focal students

• “Free thinking exercise” entire school population.

Focus of this chapter:

How are social boundaries marked, maintained, reproduced, and challenged?

ARGUMENT: Schools are legitimating and reinforcing social boundaries and hierarchies that lead to the continuous marginalization of members of the indigenous population who upon migrating to the cities de-indigenize and become either invisible or the object of open discrimination as “cholos”.

CONCERN: Can social relations be transformed through schools despite findings that schools reproduce a highly stratified and unequeal society?

In Peru race & culture = social status/hierarchy

•1940s Peru “race” as official category disappears.

•De facto racism survives although lacks profound ideology.

•Many discourses that center on “cultural differences” (Bruce, 2007; De la Cadena, 2001; Hale, 2005; Portocarrero, 2005; Quijano, 1980; Hall, 2000).

Peru’s complex system of racial stratification “pigmentocracy or colorism” - “color” includes in addition to skin tone, phenotype, hair texture and eye

color, culture and education, and class (Bonilla-Silva, 2006) “cultural racism” has become the articulating principle of racist thought and practice (Bonilla-Silva, 2006). For example….

“Well, at least speaking for myself, I don’t consider myself a racist, but sometimes what I think bothers me is the type of culture of the people, because one can be of low economic means, of very humble origins, but sometimes it is the culture that one posses that is different. So, the differences are more than just economic differences. I am not sure if it matters to some, but not to me. It has no importance” - Celia (private school student)-

Private schools “reserve the right to admission” but engage in community service projects

• Schools validate cultural prejudices through admittance policies

• Collection of supplies, clothes, and non-perishable goods

• Annual field trips to visit and conduct service projects in rural communities

• Important lessons: People they visit belong in the highlands, not in the city, certainly not in “our” schools.

• Educational tools made available ultimately do more to reinforce the rural-urban than to disrupt it.

“Like I mentioned to you earlier, I have visited several villages and there you meet such wonderful people who

are very grateful…[they are] beautiful people that are worth more than any of the people that live here in the city. Right? But the main difference I think is cultural because sometimes their culture, I don’t know if it’s

because they [indigenous people that migrate to the city] feel resentment or why, but it’s much more aggressive”

[talking about the way indigenous people who have migrated to the city are like].

Mariella: And in Arequipa, do you see problems with racism or discrimination? Carla: Yes, not so strong, but yes, there are some. Mariella: Against whom, mainly? Carla: Well, one hears expressions such as ‘oh no I am not going to go to such and such place because it will be full of people from the cerros’ (hills); or, ‘now that Plaza Vea is here [a mega store], it’s a disaster trying to go there’; one cannot get close, not even by chance, because there are lines and lines to get in, and there are several people who angrily told me: ‘darnn, all the cholos were there and they stunk’, and so on. But, things aren’t like that either. They are also in their right to be there [the people perceived as cholos] you also are a cholo for standing up there in line with them [Carla is saying this to her friends who were in line to go into the store].

Peru’s identity schizophrenia

Conclusion

Chapter findings suggest:

•Private schools using “culturalist” excuses to validate discrimination & perpetuating hierarchical social relations.

•Newcomers from rural areas become “cholos” or invisible.

•Can social relations be transformed through schools? schools mirror identity formation and in some cases reinforce it.

Recommendations:

•Re-evaluate& rethink intercultural democratic education and its implementation in urban spaces. Both places of transition and permanence need intercultural education

•A more critical analysis is needed to evaluate the role of schools that serve Peru’s privilege class in reproducing beliefs and colonial practices regarding cultural, racial, ethnic differences.

THE END

THANK YOU!

“Well, at least speaking for myself, I don’t consider myself a racist, but sometimes

what I think bothers me is the type of culture people have, because one can be of

low economic means, of very humble origins, but sometimes it is the culture that

one posses that makes a difference.”

–Celia (private school student)-

“I am a little bit racist against whites because

they reject us. Once, I was working in the

market selling clothes when by accident I ran

into a man with paler skin than mine and he

was really rude to me. He said “get out of here

chola” (she whispers) and I got offended. I

didn’t know what to say to him, I just stood

there frozen. And that is when I began to feel

resentment against white people.” –Ema

(public school student)

marredon@indiana.edu