Mapuche Poetry in the Age of Heritage

Abstract

Heritage has the potential to foster introspection and reflection about the many communities co-existing within nation-states, and therefore, can lead to complex intercultural engagement. In Chile, recent efforts to catalogue intangible collective indigenous heritage ask Mapuche groups to self-represent univocally, giving way to a limited and static understanding of Mapuche culture and presence in Chile. A productive counterpoint can be found in Mapuche poetry, specifically, in the work of renowned poet Jaime Huenún. Though not officially considered within the realm of heritage, the literary representations I analyze emphasize the equivocal and entangled nature of indigenous and non-indigenous cultures in Chile. Focusing on the metatextual space of Huenún’s anthology prologues, I show how Huenún resignifies the notion of Mapuche community beyond the national framework of heritage, offering a resource for rethinking heritage’s role in creating productive spaces for interculturality.Heritage has the potential to foster introspection and reflection about the many communities co-existing within nation-states, and therefore, can lead to complex intercultural engagement. In Chile, recent efforts to catalogue intangible collective indigenous heritage ask Mapuche groups to self-represent univocally, giving way to a limited and static understanding of Mapuche culture and presence in Chile. A productive counterpoint can be found in Mapuche poetry, specifically, in the work of renowned poet Jaime Huenún. Though not officially considered within the realm of heritage, the literary representations I analyze emphasize the equivocal and entangled nature of indigenous and non-indigenous cultures in Chile. Focusing on the metatextual space of Huenún’s anthology prologues, I show how Huenún resignifies the notion of Mapuche community beyond the national framework of heritage, offering a resource for rethinking heritage’s role in creating productive spaces for interculturality.