From Hardly Making a Living by Eating Wild Fruits to Becoming Cattle Ranchers: A Brief Timeline of Makurawe Sedentarization

https://doi.org/10.25058/20112742.n37.04

Gerardo Conde Guerrero
Escuela de Antropología e Historia del Norte de México
makurawe55@yahoo.com

Abstract:

This article aims to respond to the question of how Guarijio society happened to become sedentary. For that purpose, we turned to 16^th-century missionary sources to characterize a settling pattern called rancherias by Jesuitic missionaries. That system has to do with a unique way among indigenous people to use territory. Our fieldwork included in-depth interviews and life stories with Guarijio people, who reported how they used the environment and natural resources in an itinerant way and how they lived as farmworkers in the region. We end by pointing out that during the last forty years, due to ejido or common land bestowing—, Guarijío people have been forced to sedentarize at the behest of Mexican government.

Keywords: Makurawe, Guarijío, common landers, nomadism, sedentarization, rancherios, Mexico.