La magia de las paradojas: una reflexión sobre el entramado de REWE

Abstract

This paper explores the recent political events that have brought together, divided, and mobilized various Mapuche communities in Puelmapu (Argentina), in the regions of Río Negro, Neuquén, and Chubut, in defense and struggle for a rewe, a sacred space of great significance for the Mapuche People and especially for the role of the machi (political and philosophical authority that has the function of curing physical and spiritual ailments). In this regard, I inquire about the fate of the rewe as a symbolic and material center of conflicts between these communities and various state, judicial, and business actors. To address this ques-tion, I build upon the ideas of Pierre Bourdieu and Yvette Delsault (1975) regarding the different uses of the “magic of politics.” Specifically, I wonder if, in a context where dominant discourses contribute to simplify and trivialize the complexity of the machi’s role, the conditions are given to discuss the relevance that the preservation of their rewe has for the Mapuche People. The inherent magic of this sacred space not only creates the world on which a machi works but also the agencies with political potential to defend it. What is this political magic that makes the rewe a turning point in negotiations between the Mapuche People and state institutions? To answer this question, I organized the work into some paradoxes that explain why the rewe of a machi is, today, at the spotlight. The rewe’s power is stretched between what is considered clandestine and hidden but whose presence extends; and between emerging existences from the world of the sacred but whose frameworks of meaning belong to the realm of profane knowledge. Behind this issue, the door opens to a profound analysis of the power of the rewe in the spiritual and affective life of the people who gather there, but also in the current scenario of political disputes for the recognition of Mapuche forms of existence in the world.