Becoming criollo : relational agrodiversity and sovereignty in highland Guatemala

Author / Creator

Lanker, Marisa, author

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Online

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Summary

Which beings count in agrobiodiversity? Rather than centering only 'native' plants or 'improved' crops, three ancestrally-Mam communities in highland Guatemala are defining diversity in their own t...

Which beings count in agrobiodiversity? Rather than centering only 'native' plants or 'improved' crops, three ancestrally-Mam communities in highland Guatemala are defining diversity in their own terms. Criollo plants-as well as monte, nativo, mejorado, and more-defy binaries, transcend dominant ways of knowing, and present alternative paths for human-plant relationships. Through community-based, participatory methods, this research narrates what these communities' growers are experts in: forming and re-forming relationships with a diversely-originating array of plants. Tracing plant stories of milpa and maíz, papa, hierbamora, bledo and amaranto, ruda, café, and tomate reveals how these varied and changing relationships create grounds for fluid identity, hidden agencies, and land-connected movement of people and seeds. In the relational agricultural diversities of Chichum Majadas, Los Limones, and Unión Reforma, myriad plants hold the possibility to become welcomed, to become criollo.

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