Eduardo Restrepo

Ethnicization of blackness in Colombia: Toward de-racializing theoretical and political imagination

This paper is an ethnography of the articulation of ethnicity in the politics of blackness in Colombia. Based. on the authors fieldwork in the southern Pacific region over the last 10 years, the paper briefly describe the ethnicization of blackness in Colombia and shows how this process implies a particular articulation of memories and identities in the politics of representation of alterity. The ethnicization of blackness involves a specific ‘imagined. (black) community’ both within and beyond the nation. The specificity of this imagined. black community is anchored. in the objectification of memory, culture, nature and identity. Therefore, it is argued. that the ethnicization of blackness is not a new euphemism for race, but that to understand the particular inscriptions of blackness as an ethnic group one has to problematize the ‘racial closure’ assumed. by most scholars in the study of blackness.

Mestizo Genomics: Race Mixture, Nation, and Science in Latin America

In genetics laboratories in Brazil, Colombia and Mexico, scientists have been mapping the genomes of local populations, seeking to locate the genetic basis of complex diseases and trace population histories. As part of their work, geneticists often calculate the European, African and Amerindian genetic ancestry of populations and some scientists link their findings explicitly to questions of national identity, racial-ethnic difference and (anti-)racism, bringing their science to bear on issues of politics and identity.Based on research in the labs and beyond, this book explores how the concepts of ?race?, ethnicity, nation and gender enter into genomics and asks whether these concepts are reproduced, challenged and/or reformulated. The authors link current genomics to recent moves towards official multiculturalism in these countries and trace the implications of geneticized images of the nation for citizenship and social inclusion/exclusion.This is one of the first studies to examine the interrelations between ?race?, identity and genomics in Latin America, where national identities are based frequently based on ideas about mestizaje (race mixture), rather than racial division. As mestizaje is said to involve relations between European men and indigenous or African women, gender appears powerfully in Latin American genomics.

Biocoloniality, Governance, and the Protection of ‘Genetic Identities’ in Mexico and Colombia

In this article two case studies are compared, Mexico and Colombia, in which the protection of ‘genetic identities’ has generated political and legal systems designed to avoid the unlawful appropriation of biological material and/or DNA in Latin America. The very idea that genetic patrimonies belong to nation-states or ethno-racial groups – framed as genomic sovereignty or the protection of a disappearing indigenous genetic heritage – is the product of a genetically reified understanding of human diversity, which we identify as ‘biocoloniality’. By exploring the common tropes and imaginations with which biocoloniality has been articulated, we argue that governance mechanisms built around ‘genetic identities’ are ineffective in addressing the unequal power relations inherent in contemporary scientific and regulatory practice.

Cuestiones de método: «eventualización» y problematización en Foucault

Eventualization and problematization are categories proposed by Foucault that have not had the same impact as others of his concepts, such as biopolitics, governmentality, and genealogy. Whereas the latter notions have become part of the contemporary theoretical imaginary (mostly in the United States) and are used in multiple ways, the implications of the categories of eventualization and problematization have remained largely unexplored. This paper will examine both of these categories showing their implications on questions of method. Particularly relevant are the criticism of historical presentism and metaphysical inquiry from the perspective of eventualization; and the critique of textualist and mentalist approaches from that of problematization.

Genomic research, publics and experts in Latin America: Nation, race and body

The articles in this issue highlight contributions that studies of Latin America can make to wider debates about the effects of genomic science on public ideas about race and nation. We argue that current ideas about the power of genomics to transfigure and transform existing ways of thinking about human diversity are often overstated. If a range of social contexts are examined, the effects are uneven. Our data show that genomic knowledge can unsettle and reinforce ideas of nation and race; it can be both banal and highly politicized. In this introduction, we outline concepts of genetic knowledge in society; theories of genetics, nation and race; approaches to public understandings of science; and the Latin American contexts of transnational ideas of nation and race.

Estudios culturales y educación: Posibilidades, urgencias y limitaciones

En diferentes sitios de America Latina, los estudios culturales tienden a generar multiples desconciertos. En algunos lugares la relacion predominante con los estudios culturales es una de mucho escozor y tension porque se les asocia y se les atribuye las mas diversas ligerezas, cuando no la simple expresion de una moda intelectual importada. En otros, se les abraza cual si fuesen panacea. Hay muchos miedos e imaginarios respecto a los estudios culturales, pero tambien un monton de seducciones y embrujos.

(UN)THINKING MODERNITY AND THE BURDENS OF DIFFERENCE: A response to Escobar's paper 'Latin America at a Crossroads'

At the beginning of his paper, Escobar states ‘How one thinks about these processes is itself an object of struggle and debate, and it is at this juncture that this paper is situated’. He acknowledges the fact that the transformations that have taken place in Latin America, more so than in other situations, require that we take on certain emphases and premises. For my brief response, I do not intend to produce a close analysis of his specific interpretation of the three countries around which the entire discussion is carried out. In this sense, rather than engage in a serious dialogue with the empirical materials that support his interpretation of Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela, my comments will be directed at the more general aspects of certain premises that are part of the grid of intelligibility through which such interpretations are stated.

Talks and disputes of racism in Colombia after multiculturalism

ABSTRACT This article examines the terms that shape the notion of ethnic group for black communities. This notion allows one to understand the singularity of Colombia’s turn to multiculturalism in the 1990s, and how it has impacted the political and theoretical imaginations of cultural otherness. I will argue that this shift to multiculturalism has not meant the disappearance of the talks and disputes of racism and the beginning of a kind of ‘post-racial’ social formation. On the contrary, old and new forms of talk and disputes of racism could be traced after this shift to multiculturalism, not only in relation to the dense legislation for the recognition of black communities as ethnic groups, but also in regard to other realms such as social media, activist struggles and academic paradigms.