Vol 14 Nr 1 (2019)
Articles

Yucatecan regionalism versus the Mexican nationalist discourse

Publicerad 2019-04-04

Abstract

After the 1910 Revolution, Mexico adopted, in its speech, an assimilationist policy in which the mestizo became the official protagonist of history, thereby posing a single way of being Mexican. This work seeks to show how "the Mayan" was and has been used to build Yucatecan regionalism, and how this regionalism is a response to the national homogenizing project. Yucatecan regionalism has been accompanied by a pride that is nourished by an ambivalent relationship with “lo Maya” (admiration and contempt) and a marked distance from the country's political center and its mestizo discourse. I also want to give an account of how both nationalism and regionalism use the same resources to shape identities and how these are transformed over time.