Identity: Similarities and Differences

From the readings this week, I thought the discussion surrounding the Mayan movement was particularly interesting. Earlier in the semester when Manuel came to talk to the class, I got the impression that there was very little political effort to preserve the Mayan community and its culture in Guatemala. Consequently, it was nice to see this Maya political effort discussed at length in this reading.

Initially, I would think to myself: "Why is there not a grassroots effort for the Maya people to rise up and assert their control? They need to come together as a group to ensure that they are more included in the politics of Guatemala so that their voice is also heard...so that their influence is really felt." In this reading, it becomes even more evident just how complicated that can be. In fact, the discussion of the Mayan community reminded me of a history talk that I attended last week concerning the current state of America in terms of race and the African American community. The speaker attempted to find enough similarities within the African American community, so that he could make generalizations about the African American community as a whole. Some history professors in the audience were dissatisfied with these generalizations because they felt as if these generalizations ignored the uniqueness within the African American communities that asserts that African American people are not all the same.

This seems to be a similar issue among the Maya community when trying to organize this grassroots movement. Perhaps their situation may be even more complicated due to the amount of different languages that exist among different Maya communities. Although all African Americans are not the same, they still managed to find enough similarity to organize a grassroots effort to obtain civil rights. So the question is, is there too much difference within the Maya communities to organize a similar grassroots effort. So often we label the groups of Guatemala as simply ladino or Maya that it is easy to forget the diversity of culture within the Maya community alone. For example, if two people from different Mayan communities cannot speak the common Spanish language of the country but can only speak in their respective Maya languages, they won't even be able to communicate with each other. Is it possible to have a successful grassroots effort under these conditions? Or will there simply be a similar continuation of the current Maya vs. ladino system in which the Maya groups with the most "power" assert their culture as the face of the entire Maya community while others are left out? Perhaps the Maya community will be forced to decide what is more important. Is it more important for the Maya community as a whole to have more of a voice in Guatemala than what already exists or will the Maya community be so caught up in emphasizing the differences between different Maya communities that not enough commonality is achieved for the greater good of the entire Maya community in Guatemala?