Work in Progress, Please do not cite 1 The Tension Between Reason, Nature and Cosmologies in the Americas.

• Main Author: Alejandra Roncallo
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Indian; Quito; Alaska; Tierra del Fuego
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.475.5155; http://www.cpsa-acsp.ca/papers-2010/Roncallo.pdf

First draft – please do not cite Abstract: This paper argues that since the end of the Cold War, a new regional “double-movement, ” unleashed by the quest for land and natural resources, was in the making. The shift from closed to open regionalism and the expansion of foreign direct investment from the centre to the periphery –of the South as well as the North- was immediately met with the stern opposition of the Indigenous Peoples of Abya Yala –“Continent of Life. ” In 1990, the same year in which President Bush Sr. called for the creation of a Free Trade Area of the Americas from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego; the first continent-wide Indigenous Peoples ’ meeting in Quito, Ecuador called for the formation of a “continental consciousness. ” Paradoxically, the neo-liberal conquest of the Americas was launched at the same time in which Spain and Latin America were preparing to celebrate the 500 anniversary of the “discovery ” of the continent. Meanwhile, Indigenous peoples organized a Continental gathering entitled “500 Years of Indian Resistance ” to reject those “celebrations. ” Since then, Indigenous Peoples had four Continental Summits of Abya Yala, in the ceremonial and sacred sites of Teotihuacán (Mexico), Quito (Ecuador), Iximché (Guatemala) and Puno (Peru) to defend their rights to the land. This was a superstructural or legal battle between Western transnational regimes making and a law that originated at the “center of the earth.” Drawing on a Polanyian analysis of the land question, this paper is organized into three main parts. It starts by