Grace Alexandrino Ocaña, PhD

Chancellor´s postdoctoral fellow at University of California, Santa Cruz

Abstract

Precolonial sites in Peru, called huacas, have long been under attack by destructive forces, from Spanish colonizers to commercial developers. However, state officials and archaeologists tend to hold informal settlers–called “invasores,” or invaders–responsible for the destruction of these huacas. This talk explores how mainstream approaches to huaca conservation, enforced by Peruvian authorities and archaeologists, discriminate against the lower-, middle-, and working-class residents who self-created their neighborhoods on or around huacas. It also shows how residents organize and respond to these heritage protection policies by making huacas into vehicles for political claim-making. I, therefore, trace a more recent trajectory of huacas’ transformation from “empty” spaces to important sites for political struggles over the right to the city and rights to the past. My analysis upends the conventional thinking about archaeological preservation in Peru and in the Andes more broadly by arguing that incorporating neighboring residents’ knowledge and expectations into heritage management is key to huaca survival.