Narrating changes, recalling memory: accumulation by dispossession in food systems of Indigenous communities at the extremes of Latin America

Abstract

Food feeds knowledge and practices through generations, sustaining biocultural memories. However, prevailing economic models and state policies have driven processes of accumulation by dispossession, defined as incremental social-ecological processes by which people lose their means of production and social reproduction. We conducted a cross-hemispherical study exploring food systems of Indigenous communities inhabiting forested landscapes in Latin America. We used mixed methods that included passive and participant observation, focus groups, free lists, food diaries, oral histories, and calendars in Mapuche communities from the Chilean Andes, and Tzotzil communities from Chiapas, Mexico. Food items and their preparations have changed in both locations. Both food systems show patterns of accumulation by dispossession associated with processes of colonial history, state policies, land privatization, soil depletion, and shifts in local food preferences. Despite these distant but comparable accumulation by dispossession processes, we advocate that biocultural memory remains linked to food-related experiences and sets the basis for dynamic and resilient local food systems going forward.