Abstract

PEREZ GOMEZ, María Teresa; CRUZ MORALES, Juana; BURGUETE CAL Y MAYOR, Ruby Araceli  and  PARRA VAZQUEZ, Manuel Roberto. Fissures of the Kuxlejal in Zinacantán: the Degraded Management of Common-use Forests from the Perspective of Social Representation. Estud. cult. maya [online]. 2024, vol.64, pp.289-319.  Epub Mar 11, 2025. ISSN 0185-2574.  https://doi.org/10.19130/iifl.ecm.64.2024/0011wx00s900.

Natural resources within the territory of indigenous peoples are not only collective property, but also become part of the patrimony with which diverse practices and knowledge are explained and grounded. Thus, each culture of native peoples becomes unique, since it has its own way of life, as well as ways of interpreting the world and perceiving the environment; this whole set, in Tsotsil, is called talel kuxlejal. When the talel kuxlejal is modified, various activities, knowledge and practices are altered, affecting the elements that are a fundamental part of their kuxlejal (life), such as forests. The purpose of this contribution was to document the common knowledge of zinacantecos and zinacantecas in relation to forests for common use. The information was collected through in-depth interviews and field observation. The analysis is based on the Theory of Social Representations. The results indicate that the degradation of forests for common use is due to: population increase, generational and political change, and the incorporation of the population into the market economy; which as a whole has caused a fissure in the kuxlejal of the zinacantecos.

Keywords : Territory; Market Economy; Communal Property; Floriculture; Tsotsil Indigenous.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )