Indigenismo, educación colonial y etnoeducación

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to address indigenism as a political and cultural movement which seeks to defend the socio-political identity and the cultural value of Indian Americans. This movement, which arose from post-colonial discourse that is crucial for development, and from the worldviews of indigenous communities, proposes an alternative in the search of collective welfare. This alternative is «El Buen Vivir» (The Good Living) which pursues other ways of development that are more in accordance with the respect for Pachamama (Mother Earth) and where human beings are considered an inherent part of the natural and socio environment that surrounds them. In the same way, this work aims to show how from indigenous movements, natives communities struggle for their own education that allows them to maintain their ancestral knowledge, threatened in the present by the new neo-colonialism. This work emerges from the concerns generated by the authors’ own experiences and their knowledge from several research projects that involved direct participation with indigenous communities from Abya Yala.