The Disfrazados of San Juan Mixtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico: Practicing Tradition and Cultural Identity in a Contemporary Indigenous Transnational Migratory Community

Ivy Rieger

doi:10.33823/jfs.2022.4.1.108

Authors

Ivy Rieger Hartnell College

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.33823/jfs.2022.4.1.108

Keywords:

Mixtec, Mexico, Festivals, Tradition, Identity, Migration, Indigenous cultures

Abstract

This article explores what work the disfrazados (jester characters) do to sustain and promote the construction of contemporary cultural identities and senses of belonging among the members of the Indigenous Mixtec community of San Juan Mixtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico. Disfrazados are poignant examples of what anthropologist Peggy Levitt termed “social remittances,” key elements for creating social and cultural capital in this transnational migratory community. The article extends theoretical discussions about Indigenous peoples in Mexico beyond traditional analyses of economic remittances by exploring their “non-monetary contributions to development,” specifically regarding the construction, maintenance, and practice of cultural identities and senses of belonging through performance.

Author Biography

Ivy Rieger, Hartnell College

Dr. Ivy Rieger received her doctorate in Anthropology from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2015. She primarily specializes in theoretical questions related to practice, belonging, and performance among indigenous groups in Mexico where she has conducted extensive ethnographic research focusing on festivals, rituals, cultural memory, and the production of identity. She is co-editor of the volume “These Thin Partitions: Bridging the Growing Divide Between Cultural Anthropology and Archaeology” published the University of Colorado Press (2017). Dr. Rieger is a Level I investigator in the Mexican National System of Investigators (SNI) and currently works as an adjunct professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Hartnell College in Salinas, California.