Tradition and neo modernity in Latin America

Abstract

This article is geared toward the analysis of the current controversy
on the content of the Latin American identity. The substantive
material composing this debate is centered on divergent conceptions on
modernity and cultural diversity. The simultaneous presence of local
and international motivations that have involved social movements in
Latin America along the seventies, have underlined new codes emerging
out of the political and cultural spheres, themselves. By this token,
those movements have been based on the intimate relation between
tradition and the western neo-modemity. This is case of the feminist
and indian social movements, in a very peculiar mode. A large interview
with a women indian leader of Guatemala serves as a reference to
the understanding of the intricate building process of identity, ethnic
and gender, in the processes of social conflics, at large. The final outcome
is neither a defense of an outlasting tradition, nor the sheer submission
to modernity as an encompassing concept. The actual discourse results to be founded on the paradox linking construction and reconstruction
of equality and difference, which comes to introduce the alterity.
Therefore, the recognition of varying forms of social dynamics
becomes viable, given its visibility.