Permitted Indians and Popular Music in Contemporary Peru: The Poetics and Politics of Indigenous Performativity

Abstract

O a generation ago, two dark futures were widely foreseen for the indigenous peoples of Latin America: either they would wither away in irredentist isolation, resistant to the spirit of modern times, or they would be forced into the urban proletariat, losing their distinct identities as they dissolved into the continent’s underclass. Instead, over the past three decades, indigenous actors returned questions of cultural difference and survival to the public agenda. Revitalization movements spread widely, indigenous leaders assumed meaningful roles in forums of national and international politics, and legal battles were won over issues like land use, political autonomy, and intellectual property. Amidst these developments, however, the cachet of indigenous cultural forms continues to attract the interest of entrepreneurs who harness indigenous cultural production, seeking to profit by satisfying metropolitan appetites for the exotic, the picturesque, the spiritual, and the authentic. Even where demands for respect are recognized, the validation of cultural practice can itself become a threat to indigenous well-being if multicultural rhetoric is treated as a substitute for more substantive conversations about economic or political demands (Hale 2002). In sum, the space of indigeneity is more vital and contested than ever, calling for analyses that recognize the diversity of contemporary indigenous experience. In this article I discuss two Peruvian bands whose recent success derives from the unusually central affirmation of indigeneity in their performances. Both sing in Quechua, the country’s most widely spoken indigenous language, but otherwise their methods of evoking indigenous identity differ starkly. The first is Uchpa, a Lima-based band that combines elements of blues, hard rock, and traditional Andean performance in order to promote Quechua language and culture. The second is the expatriate quartet Alborada, whose rhetoric of indigenous consciousness is tied to their use of New Age and Native North