Happy to share a brand new article, titled “Constructing the Ecological Native,” published in a special issue of the Journal of Folklore Research on the theme of “Traveling Theory.” It’s in Volume 62, Number 1-2, dated January-August of 2025, and it occupies pages 63-84 of this issue. With thanks to my former student and current colleague Hande Birkalan-Gedik for inviting me to join this lively (and lovely) conversation, I offer below the abstract for my article:
“In this essay, I feature an instance of traveling theory in which the conceptual framework originates in Indigenous rather than academic cultures, the transfer intertwines local and global discourses, and the process is a reciprocal one that eventually produces a hybrid discursive field. My focal point is “the ecological native,” which I perceive to be a mobile theoretical construct with footing both in Indigenous communities of the Colombian Andes and in global discursive networks. My aim is to track its emergence as a hybrid emblematic figure at the confluence of Indigeneity and modernity, and to account for its efficacy both within and beyond these communities of origin. I contend that “the ecological native” is composed of a cluster of conceptual propositions—that Indigenous peoples have a longstanding and spiritual connection to the land, that this connection makes them suitable as custodians of that land, and that the survival of their communities, their languages, and their cultures is tied to their persistence on the land. My case study features two Indigenous communities in Colombia’s Sibundoy Valley, where an ethnopolitical movement centered on a historical cacique advances a claim of ecosovereignty based on spiritual practices of the Indigenous doctors and the nurturing cultural practices of the valley’s exemplary women. I conclude that the ecological native, in this setting at least, possesses cultural relevancy and serves as a valuable point of entry into larger arenas of political debate.”
One of the riches in this piece is the wisdom of storyteller Mariano Chicunque, pictured here from the time we spent together in Colombia’s Sibundoy Valley:
