Introduction, or declaration of intent

• This is a syllabus that explores the struggles of indigenous groups in Latin America for greater autonomy, economic rights, political rights, and social rights. This document is a collection of the ideas and content we have explored in our Spring 2019 History of Indigenous Rights in Latin America course at Carleton College with professor Elena McGrath.
• This course encouraged students to think about indigenous history in Latin America and the dynamic and important histories of a variety of indigenous groups who suffered, adapted, and resisted the colonial project and its neo-colonial legacies. We attempted to investigate how indigenous groups existed materially and understood themselves symbolically, along with how different conceptions of identity were constructed. We hope that this syllabus goes beyond recounting histories of subjugation to showcase and emphasize the diverse forms of resistance, autonomy, and decolonial struggle which have existed throughout history and – hopefully – will define the struggles for indigenous rights into the future.

In this course, we critically engaged with indigenous rights movements using four case studies: Bolivia, Colombia, Peru, and Chile. With this syllabus, we hope to:

1. Complicate and contextualize
   1. how indigeneity is defined and deployed by individuals and political entities
   2. how indigeneity intersects with other forms of identities
2. Expand conceptualizations of coloniality and decolonization (for example, to include its implications on gender, sexuality, and ethnicity and to understand coloniality as an ongoing issue)
3. Explore different approaches to issues of indigenous rights when these concepts are so complicated
4. Acknowledge that the production of knowledge has implications in real terms and can be used to either empower or disempower
5. Produce knowledge that is useful outside beyond an academic context

In our discussions and readings, we explored the unique perspectives from indigenous political activists in different countries of Latin America, traced the history of revolutionary movements, learned about political figures that had an impact in these movements and reflected on our own past and present knowledge of what it means to be indigenous. Through reading and discussion we have identified themes present in indigenous rights movements in these states and how indigenous rights movements have evolved throughout history in these places. Such themes include ethnicity, race, gender, land rights, literacy, neoliberalism, and the legacies of colonization. By analyzing these movements we have sought to better understand processes of decolonization.
Disclaimer or statement of intellectual humility
This is a syllabus constructed by undergraduate students at a US academic institution, which does not make us an authoritative voice on Indigenous Rights but rather a collective of insightful readings, conversations, and questions worth putting out for further exploration. While we as a group come from many diverse identities with many different differences, we, for the most part, do not claim a Latin American indigenous identity. As such, the inclusion of western theoretical frameworks should not be taken as an authentic truth but instead, as an attempt to help view the indigenous communities as their own producers of knowledge not limited to being subjects of study. We hope to function as nothing more than scribes. With indigeneity being a complex and ever changing concept, the resources we provide have been done to the best of our abilities/knowledge but may not fully cover everything there is to know about indigeneity.
We realize the power dynamics and hierarchies of our own positionality at an elite private liberal arts college in the United States and hope that this syllabus sparks hierarchy-aware, counter-hegemonic dialogue which works to resist, subvert, and reimagine the hierarchies in which we exist.