“I didn’t know I was indigenous…” : Life story of the Pijao majority Carmenza Aroca

Abstract

This document presents the life story of Carmenza Aroca, a Pijao indigenous member from the San Antonio de Calarma Indigenous Reservation, located in the municipality of San Antonio, southwest of the department of Tolima (Colombia). This life story facilitates the tracing of elements of the individual identity of Carmenza Aroca and her process of re-ethnicization, her participation in the Pijao struggles and the vicissitudes she has had to overcome as an indigenous person. Here, the life story and the "testimonial dialogues" as methodological devices enable the interpretation of an era and a society in which ethnic difference has been historically stigmatized by the majority community, while allowing us to glimpse the sociopolitical, economic, cultural and territorial dynamics that are configured in the southwest of Tolima.