Welcome to the 8th Forum on "Globalization and the Natural Beings of the Sierra Juarez" and the 3rd Festival of Corn.  February 21-22, 2009 in the community of Lachixila (northeast Oaxaca, in the mountains of the Sierra Norte, or Sierra Juarez)  - organized by UNOSJO, Union of Organizations of the Sierra Juarez of Oaxaca.

Lachixila has written a Communal Statute describing their traditional communal governance, a document that comes from oral traditions that they’ve written down for internal use.  They emphasize that it is a dynamic living document, and its main purpose is to protect their autonomy.  

During the first day of workshops, UNOSJO director Aldo Gonzalez told us the name of this forum had been changed from "Globalization and Natural Resources" to "Natural Beings" to reflect that all of life in these mountains is inherently valuable.  The main themes of the weekend were autonomy and food sovereignty, with a lot of attention given to the dangers of transgenic corn.

Strung up along the outside edges of the space where the forum and festival were held was a touring photography exhibit called Pueblos de Maiz or People of Corn.  These vibrant images depicted just a small sampling of the varieties of corn of all colors and shapes cultivated in Mexico, the integrated fields or milpas where corn is cultivated along with other crops and useful plants, and many scenes of food traditions representing the cultural diversity throughout Mexico of people who depend on corn as a staple of their diet - as well as contrasting scenes of monocropped, industrial agriculture.

Hanging behind these men is a news wall, with articles posted about a variety of topics for general community education, from climate change to transgenic corn to excerpts from the Constitution.

Valdemar gave the first presentation; he was introduced as an engineer and long-time collaborator with UNOSJO.  He gave a talk on how the Mexican countryside has changed in the past century, explaining the effects of the Green Revolution on agriculture, NAFTA, the presidencies and policies of Salinas de Gortari and Zedillo...

Aldo Gonzalez of UNOSJO gave the next talk, starting out with a series of hand drawn maps showing the state of Oaxaca, the Zapotec territory in Oaxaca, and then of this particular region in the Sierra Juarez (the Rincon Baja).  With these maps he emphasized the differences between the traditional territory divisions of indigenous peoples vs. the borders created by the Mexican government.

This led up to him explaining the Mexico Indigena community mapping project, the funding from the US military that was not disclosed, and the implications of the information gathered, like place names.  He gave many examples of place names in Zapotec that reveal aspects of the landscape that are not otherwise easily known; where a certain bird species lives, or where there is an underground spring, for example.  He shared that this controversy has exploded over the internet; he is actively working with communities in this region to raise awareness and come to consensus about how to demand their rights as indigenous, sovereign people to their own land and knowledge.

Aldo also shared a well known anecdote about an early anthropologist working in this region, who one night, after a few drinks, had opened up about why he was there: “Because soon you are going to forget your language and all of your traditional knowledge, and we will have to come back and teach it to you.”  I was at this event to translate for students from Norway who had interviewed UNOSJO organizers about food sovereignty, and specifically came here this weekend to do interviews with campesinos - we had a good talk later reflecting on this long history of both colonialism and academic "studies", and what that means for our own presence and intentions in this community.

The final workshop was given by a woman named Coca who has worked with women in this region for many years, doing sex education and gender workshops.  She explored the theme of violence, not only against women, but also the systemic violence in society, economic violence as the disastrous social results of free trade agreements, loss of food sovereignty, etc.  She also did an activity with us about power relationships.

After the 3 presentations/workshops, small groups discussed 3 questions: What are the problems that we face as campesinos?  What are the obstacles we face to exercising our autonomy?  What does violence mean to us/what does it look like in our communities?  These questions helped summarize and synthesize the earlier presentations.

The next step was Proposals and Commitments: What can we do in the face of these problems?  What can we do to strengthen our autonomy?  How can we stop violence against women in our communities?

After a long day and a half of presentations and discussions, the afternoon of the 2nd day erupted suddenly into a flurry of activity.  Rows of chairs were moved aside and women of all ages rushed to set up long benches and get to work grinding corn, yucca, beans, herbs... demonstrating the preparation of traditional foods in this region. This was especially powerful after I had been translating for interviews the day before, and we'd heard men who were maybe 50 years old share their memories of when food from the outside started coming in to this relatively isolated region - rice, canned sardines, etc - and witnessing how rapidly diets have changed.

Kids and adults alike crowded around, taking pictures and video.  One of the organizers of the event walked down the line with a microphone, interviewing women about what they were making and keeping up a lively, educational atmosphere for this 3rd annual festival dedicated to making sure local food traditions are passed down to the next generations.