Difference, Indigeneity and Ethnoclass Convergence

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis of the politico-economic and ethnic-social basis of difference, paying special attention to the anti-difference violence suffered by indigenous peoples and the concrete experience of the Gurani-Kaiowa in Brazil. Ethnic-social differences and commonalities are here examined through a social sciences reinterpretation of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. In this magistral book, Hegel problematises and gradually resolves many questions about human perception, the shortcomings of reason, and the incremental evolution of reason that can only happen through mediation and interaction. The unique features of each social group can consequently expand into ethnoclass commonalities shared with other, unique populations. That is particularly relevant to understand the many pressures to reduce the Guarani-Kaiowa to an indeterminate proletarian condition (generic members of the working class or the peasantry), which has nonetheless revitalised their sense of indigeneity. The Guarani-Kaiowa are different from other segments of the working class, but the more they see, and are seen, as different, the more immersed they become in the subalternity of the rest of the dispossessed population. The identification of the indigenous population as both members of the working class and of unique ethnical groups has major political consequences (the negation of the negation) in terms of poor-poor alliances that can challenge politico-economic trends and, particularly, the illegitimate concessions to agribusiness farmers.