Education and Community Engagement in Schools in the Communities of Contulmo and Tirua, Chile. Interculturality, Micropolitics and Territories

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-73782017000200009

Keywords:

Intercultural education, Community participation, Human rights, School, Cultural diversity, Mapuche culture

Abstract

This article describes three factors that foster the link between educational models and community engagement processes in Mapuche communities in Chile. In this context, the article reveals, through the analysis of various experiences, how communities have done a progressive re-signification of the schools: defining them as a space for participation and collective confluence, where diverse community tensions and agreements are manifested; positioning them as strategic nodes for the definition and appropriation of the territory. This allows us to deepen the analysis of the relationship between schools and communities, by identifying and characterizing the factors that enhance and inhibit it, in order to identify how they operate and how schools are perceived within the Mapuche communities in the communes mentioned above. Several testimonies were collected from members of the three schools that participated and other communities' stakeholders. These testimonies where analyzed qualitatively, which allowed the identification of diverse community engagement dynamics that affect, on a small scale, in the design and execution of educational proposals with cultural and territorial relevance, positioning the schools as spaces of community confluence.

Author Biographies

Inti Torres Villegas, Universidad de Concepción

Magister en Investigación Social y Desarrollo por la Universidad de Concepción. Becario de la Fundación W.K Kellogg para el Programa de Formación de Liderazgo en 2011 y para el Programa de Liderazgo Social en 2015. Colaborador durante más de siete años en diversas organizaciones no gubernamentales en el sur de México en temáticas relacionadas a la educación intercultural y a la participación de niñas, niños y adolescentes en comunidades mayas en el Estado de Yucatán.

Noelia Carrasco Henríquez, Universidad de Concepción

Profesora Asociada de la Universidad de Concepción, Chile. Doctora en Antropología Social y Cultural por la Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona. Su línea de investigación son los estudios antropológicos del desarrollo, la antropología económica aplicada y la ecología política. Sus campos de trabajo etnográfico han sido los procesos de intervención y soberanía alimentaria, los relatos y las prácticas del desarrollo y la expansión de los monocultivos forestales en contexto de globalización capitalista. Imparte docencia en los campos de la antropología cultural, antropología económica y antropología aplicada, en programas de pre y post grado.

Published

2017-11-01

How to Cite

Torres Villegas, I., & Carrasco Henríquez, N. (2017). Education and Community Engagement in Schools in the Communities of Contulmo and Tirua, Chile. Interculturality, Micropolitics and Territories. Latin American Journal of Inclusive Education, 11(2), 125–139. https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-73782017000200009