Ritual and Historical Construction of an Utopic Community. Xochitlalis in the Sierra de Zongolica

Abstract

This paper analyzes a ritual of cultural reelaboration in which different ways of indigenous modernity and collective subjectivities converge, which are faced in a contentious space, marked by the commodification of culture. These are rituals that are performed in natural spaces of great beauty in the Nahua region of the Sierra de Zongolica, in the state of Veracruz, Mexico, which have attracted the growing arrival of local and regional tourism. The analysis focuses on the construction of community forms, promoted through the performance of rituals and ceremonies. The discussion is found in the different applications of the concept of communalism, and in the visions found that its management has aroused in anthropo-logical studies. The framework is found in the multicultural policies of the neoliberal state and in the role of indigenous intellectuals in the creation and dissemination of imaginary and development of utopian communities.