Chile's Pacific coast, which extends for more than 6,400 kilometers, has been home to Chango, Lafkenche, Chono, Yagane, Kaweskar, Selk'nam and other Indigenous peoples since time immemorial.
Genocidal practices perpetrated by Spanish colonizers and continued by the Chilean state have taken a horrific toll on these peoples. Official accounts suggest they are part of the past; and that their lifeways, knowledge and practices have long since disappeared.
In late December, we met Natalia Guerrero in Pichilemu, a coastal town 200 kilometers southwest of Santiago. Born and raised in Pichilemu, Guerrero is a member of the Chango people. She is spokesperson for the National Council of the Chango People in the O'Higgins region of Chile’s Sixth Administrative District.
Founded in 2020, the Council was born of Chango struggles to defend the maritorio [a word combining mar —sea—and territory] and their right to self-determination as a people. "For us, the maritorio is not just the sea, but the sea and land and their complex interconnection," Guerrero said. "We are in a zone of interfaces, which is full of vital biological and ecological processes."
Council members began to engage the Chilean state politically in 2020, the same year they produced a documentary called, in English, Millennial Algae Collectors: The Return of the Ancestors of the Changos and the Sea People of Cardenal Caro.
Since the 1960s, Pichilemu has been known internationally as Chile’s "surf capital." Its streets are dotted with signs and directions in English for the benefit of foreign surfers. We walked a couple of blocks through the city with Guerrero until we reached Infiernillo beach, where we spoke while looking out at the sea.
Behind us was a ruca [house], surrounded by a seaweed garden drying in the sun. In it, a family of mareros—people who live and work at sea—were assembling suitcase-like baskets of cochayuyo. Cochayuyo is an edible seaweed abundant in the area. It is part of Chile’s traditional cuisine and a one of few exports oriented toward China that continues to be harvested and gathered according to artisanal practices.
In addition to following in the lifeways of her marera ancestors, Guerrero is a sociologist and researcher, which has complemented her own process and solidified her decolonial and Indigenous perspective.
Her knowledge and skills remain rooted in Pichilemu, despite the colonial dispossession of her great-great-grandmothers. Today, forest fires threaten the area, as do industrial logging, sea privatization and, more recently, luxury real estate developers, who have invaded the region with the support of Chile’s political oligarchy. The sense of devastation is palpable.
In this interview, which has been edited for length and clarity, we discussed the broad outlines of these paths and processes with Guerrero.
read more: https://www.ojala.mx/en/ojala-en/self-recognition-dispossession-and-the-sea-in-chile