By rmattiola
It’s time to talk about this. I am perpetually congested here in the beautiful south. I returned from Puerto Saavedra to Temuco on Thursday to play field hockey. Once I arrived, I received a text telling me practice was cancelled due to “environmental emergency”. I asked, what does that mean? My friend explained that all the wood burning stoves and heaters in the towns and city produce so much smoke which gets trapped and can dangerously effect their health if they were to vigorously exercise outdoors for 2 hours. On the bus rides back during the evening, I noticed flumes of smoke hovering over the semi-suburban villages outside the city. I couldn’t help but think about Chile’s carbon footprint. Let’s start with excessive wood burning. Toss in acres and acres of cows—happy cows. Recall the constant tacos (traffic jams) throughout all the cities. Wrap it all up with the fact that recycling is essentially non-existent. Loads of plastic and glass get thrown in with food scraps. It’s infuriating. But remind yourself of the 20 or so wind turbines you saw in the desert to Atacama. And remind yourself that the people are just living the system put in place for them by their government. All this though is especially confusing when I listen to my indigenous interviewees teaching me about their strong connection to naturaleza, and how we are all born from mother earth. What’s even weirder is that plenty of people talk about climate change. Not only do they believe it, but they’re experiencing it. And yet they sit, subversive to their government that’s not mandating clean energy and providing extensive recycling services. I vowed to go back to the U.S. and live as environmentally clean as I can. I plan to go completely vegetarian again… nearly vegan due to my lactose intolerance. I plan to learn more than I already do about recycling and sorting. I’ll ride my bike around Coopersburg, like I did when I was a tween. I’ll eat local crops from my dad’s Co-op and the town farmer’s market. I’ll go out to all those rallies back in DC on the national mall, in front of the white house and congress building, and demand a transition to clean energy. If you know me, you’ve heard this before, so I’ll move on.
At this point, I have collected, transcribed and re-read 10 interviews with mapuche professionals, a machi and a artisanal vendor. I’ve also collected and recorded the information from 27 surveys with patients and town citizens. This work was all gathered over a short 2 weeks (my first week was spent planning and preparing). This week, I decided to be done collecting information and focus my time instead into analyzing and writing with hopes of completing the project early and traveling a bit.
These 2 weeks were not without struggle or frustration. I’ve had to negotiate my intent on several occasions, frequently weighing anthropological ethics. I’ve come to the conclusion that this assignment—the ISP—is ethically irresponsible and I intend to present my opinion to the program directors and coordinators. The ISP in theory sounds great, and it is an excellent learning experience. But this sort of project is not suited for sensitive anthropological study of burdened indigenous communities. The one-month time frame forces the use of reckless methods.
The biggest concept I learned from all this is that obtaining information you didn’t originally intend to is perfectly acceptable and valuable. I’m saving all the cool experiences and quotes from data collecting for the research project. Those of you who wish to read about it will be able to since I’m writing it in both English and Spanish. Now excuse me, I have plenty of other writing for both my project and for a letter of concern.
Mapuzungun word of the week: chal tu may: thank you