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The author shares the circumstances that led to his encounter with the personal archives of Victor Haim Perera (1934-2003), an award-winning Sephardic-American writer, journalist, environmental and political activist, and academic born in Guatemala City. Perera published six books on topics as varied as Sephardic history, the Maya Indians, and the Loch Ness monster, and contributed dozens of articles, short stories, and essays to newspapers, trade journals, magazines, and literary anthologies. This paper also provides an overview of Perera's life and work and shares information about the Victor Perera Papers collection at the University of Michigan Library. It presents a case study illustrating that library catalogers can improve discoverability of and access to library special collections by expanding beyond their core duties and investigating the contexts behind the materials that cross their desks. The article ends with a preliminary bibliography of Perera's works. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes a series of extralegal procedures implemented by Guatemalans to acquire Mexican personal identification documents. The research focuses on the experiences of descendants of families who took refuge in Mexico during the 1980s and 1990s and returned to Guatemala between 1994 and 1996. These young people, born in Guatemala after their parents returned to their country of origin, employed the practice of buying Mexican birth certificates which were later used to enter Mexico legally. The fieldwork was carried out in two Guatemalan villages, as well as two Mexican ones, located in Cancun and Playa del Carmen. The main argument is that for them Mexican identification documents become a singular force that confers recognition and offers them the possibility to be incorporated into governmental logic which grants material benefits. Such forms of political imagination are related to the experiences of multiple documentation accumulated by older generations during their refuge period and are now encouraged by the Mexican State's new border security strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global tourism competition has entered home and family space. Drawing upon ethnographic research in Guatemala, this paper investigates the postcolonial gendered politics that shape (and are shaped by) global tourism competition, homestays, and mothering labour. It shows how Guatemalan women turn to hosting as an economic strategy and, in doing so, become part of a complex power relationship between Spanish schools and their (primarily Western) language tourists (or ‘students’). Spanish schools only work with ‘host-mums’ deemed capable of meeting their students’ needs, desires, and expectations of homestays as affordable, enjoyable, pedagogical experiences of ‘real’ family. To achieve this, Guatemalan women become cosmopolitan, competitive subjects who devise and enact strategies to commodify, transform, and perform their mothering labour and homes/families in ways that appeal to their Western students. Far beyond creating desirable touristic experiences, the everyday competitive mothering of tourists is having widespread consequences at the personal, local, and global levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many scholars, analysts and commentators have noted that the neoliberal conjuncture has seen the rise of a veritable explosion of discourses and theories of resilience. Some regard this discursive and narrative profusion as integral to the ongoing project of a neoliberal 'worlding' that seeks to reconfigure all aspects of human subjectivities and social relations. Meanwhile, the ongoing outpouring of neoliberal discourses and narratives of resilience is accompanied by the expansion of disasterscapes across the planet as we speed apparently toward what the Caribbean scholar Sylvia Wynter calls an 'unparalleled catastrophe for our species'. Some of these expanding disasterscapes are emerging across the terrain of a five-hundred-year history of genocidal and appropriative colonial practices. The people and communities inhabiting these disasterscapes have been struggling to develop counter-praxes of collective cultural resilience and survival in the face of the many catastrophes wrought over the centuries by coloniality. We turn to Wynter's concept of homo narrans to examine Indigenous praxes for the performative enactment of alternative genres of the human that contest the worlding of neoliberal discourses and apparatuses of resilience. Wynter's contributions to the de-universalization and thus relativization of Eurocentric 'Man' aim to make the present proliferation of the genres of humanity, our storytelling species, culturally intelligible in ways that might not only undercut the work done by neoliberal discourses of resilience toward the production of disastrous consequences in places like Guatemala and the obliteration of our capacities to imagine the world otherwise, but perhaps even ward off the potentially impending 'unparalleled catastrophe for our species'. This paper draws on our ongoing research in Guatemala, which involves Indigenous and poor ladino survivors of the 2018 eruption of the Fuego Volcano, as well as survivors of the 2005 landslide that followed Hurricane Stan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effects of individual and household characteristics on time allocation decisions for both women and men, and how these effects have evolved in Urban Guatemala using data from the National Survey of Living Conditions (2000 and 2014). We built a multivariate Tobit to model the decision of individuals to allocate time, distinguishing between three different types of time uses: housework, childcare and paid work. The results suggest that time allocation is strongly determined by gender. For both periods, on average, women devote more time to housework and childcare than men, while men spent more hours in paid work than their counterparts. However, men that report themselves as spouses tend to allocate significantly more hours to housework and childcare in 2014. Moreover, women's time allocation is more responsive to individuals and household characteristics than men in both periods. Finally, we find that educational attainment plays a central role in shaping how individuals allocate their time between market and non-market activities, especially for women. For instance, while housework time is negatively associated with education level, time devoted to childcare increases with instruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper ethnographically explores how indigenous Guatemalan youth come to desire non-migration despite local social-geographical contexts of extensive mobility. The 2014 the emergence of a 'crisis' of youth migration at the U.S. Southern border drew attention to the deep and longer-term reality of untenable conditions in the countries young people are fleeing. While significant scholarship has been dedicated to exploring the causes and conditions propelling youth migration, the experiences of young people en route, their reception in destination countries, and concerns over youth return and reintegration, little attention has been paid to young people who, in contexts of extensive migration, strive to remain in their communities of origin. This paper disrupts the mobility bias in migration studies and attends to the local and historically situated forces through which migratory contexts are heterogeneously experienced and engaged. In so doing, this research provides ethnographic material to demonstrate how desired immobility emerges in an overwhelmingly mobile context, illustrates the social, historical and structural fields that engage youth (im)mobilities, and argues for the analytic relevance of striving as a means by which desire is enacted (in this case the desire to stay put). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1996, Guatemala's Peace Accords were signed, concluding 36 years of war and genocide. However, persisting violence, including violences against women (VAW) and criminalisation of human rights defenders protesting inequalities provoked by postwar extractivism, threatens the democracy promised through formal peace. Specifically, women human rights defenders (WHRDs) play key roles in these struggles, which this paper explores. Drawing on ten months of qualitative fieldwork in Maya Q'eqchi' communities in the Northern Transversal Strip (FTN) region, I ask: what roles do WHRDs play in resolving VAW and in challenging gendered and environmental injustices? Secondly, what political and collective strategies are drawn on by WHRDs; what challenges do they face; and what movements and processes do they engage in, to envision a better future? This paper foregrounds the intersections of municipal political spaces and a constellation of postwar women's rights legal frameworks, including a 2008 Law on Femicide criminalising all forms of VAW as central to WHRDs' mobilisations. I explore how locally elected members of consejos de mujeres (women's councils) and municipal oficinas de la mujer (women's offices) offer important spaces for WHRDs to organise collectively. I also highlight connections between WHRDs' struggles against VAW, extractivism, and environmental devastation in the FTN. Simultaneously, I identify several 'roadblocks' to WHRDs' engagement in these spaces and the dangers and criminalisation they face. Ultimately, such 'roadblocks' contribute to a vernacularisation of women's rights in the FTN, which instrumentalises and empowers the language of rights for WHRDs' struggles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Guatemala has one of the highest firearm homicide rates and gun ownership per capita in the world. This paper discusses the extent to which it stands as a case to add to the routine activity hypothesis versus the fear hypothesis. Using a negative binomial regression model, this study tested the relationship between firearm possession and homicide rates in its municipalities in 2018. A new dataset at the municipal level on firearm possession and ownership for 2018 was obtained from DIGECAM. The data were obtained from the National Civil Police and the 2018 Population and Housing Census. The authors found empirical evidence stating that the absence of security, justice institutions, and regional subculture of violence leads the population to use firearms due to fear or perceived risk of self-protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability is a global mandate and has set agendas for regions, nations, sectors, and corporations. Because of the globalized nature of the economy, the pursuit of sustainability in one place has implications for others. The aim of this paper is to describe how a sector—the Guatemalan Sugarcane Agro‐industry (GSAI)—can make progress toward sustainability and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals of the country in which it operates. The methodology used was a case study description, based largely on data reported by the GSAI. The main findings of the study show that the contributions of the industry to water and sanitation in its area of operations have been important, but limited, due to several factors that include issues such as: lack of political will, lack of technical capacity, financing, and appropriate legislation. On the other hand, the contributions of the GSAI to energy have been remarkable for the Guatemalan energy matrix, highlighting that cogeneration from sugarcane bagasse represents up to 30% of the electricity demand in the country during the 6‐month harvest season. Building on social corporate responsibility theory, the actions related to the goals on water and energy are explained. What was found is that the contributions of a sector, though important, are possibly not outstanding at the national scale, and that the conditions of the country limit the reach or pace of progress of the sector. An exception is the contributions toward sustainable energy and associated emissions, which are noteworthy. The interplay of actors at different scales needs to be understood if globally we are to achieve the goals. This understanding is key to put in place policies and enabling conditions for sectors to make progress faster, helping their country advance as well as contributing to sustainability of buyers in other countries or regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Global Compact on Migration and International Organizations pay increasing focus to fair migrant labor recruitment. By looking at the temporary migration of Guatemalans to Canada, this paper demonstrates that migrants play a crucial role in managing labor migration. Based on interviews with Guatemalan migrants, recruiters, and Canadian employers, I analyze the dual role of migrants, as both producers and subjects of recruitment practices. I build upon the concept of the migration industry to show how this phenomenon creates a grey zone of migration brokerage at the crossroads of business and social networks, problematizing the global discourse on fair recruitment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper engages a Maya sonorous concept known as "q'ojom" as a means of understanding the role of sound in the K'iche' Maya Popol Wuj. While the notion that the Popol Wuj and similar texts are performative in nature has been widely recognized and well-studied, we argue that an analysis of the text grounded in q'ojom enables us to better grasp how such a performance may have been carried out, as well as how sound itself is integral at different moments in the text. As this article is also a collaboration among Maya and non-Maya scholars, we also hope that it plays a small role in furthering efforts to develop and hone new forms of scholarship and relations in the hemisphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This is the final of 10 papers that describe the implementation of the Expanded Census-Based, Impact-Oriented Approach (CBIO+) by Curamericas/Guatemala in the Cuchumatanes mountains of the Department of Huehuetenango and its effectiveness in improving the health and well-being of women and children in a population of 98,000 in three municipalities. The CBIO+ Approach consists of three components: the CBIO (Census-Based, Impact-Oriented) Approach, the Care Group Approach, and the Community Birthing Center Approach. Methods: Each of the preceding papers was summarized. An assessment was made regarding the degree to which the initial implementation research hypotheses were confirmed. The total field cost per capita for operation of the Project was calculated. An assessment of the cost-effectiveness of the Project was made based on the estimated impact of the Project, the number of lives saved, and the number of disability-adjusted life years averted. Results: The Project attained a number of notable achievements in terms of expanding the coverage of key maternal and child health interventions, improving the nutritional status of children, reducing the mortality of children and mothers, providing quality care for mothers at the Community Birthing Centers (Casas Maternas Rurales) that integrate traditional midwives (comadronas) into the care of women during childbirth at the birthing centers, as well as empowering women and building social capital in the communities. CBIO+ is an effective and affordable approach that is particularly notable for its capacity to engage communities in the process of improving the health of mothers and children. Overall, there is strong and consistent evidence in support of the research hypotheses. The findings did produce evidence of declines in under-5 and maternal mortality, but they were not as robust as had been hoped. Conclusion: CBIO+ is an approach that has been effective in engaging communities in the process of improving the health of their mothers and children and in reducing health inequities in this marginalized, difficult-to-reach population of Indigenous Maya people. The CBIO+ Approach is cost-effective and merits further development and broader application in Guatemala and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Curamericas/Guatemala Maternal and Child Health Project, 2011–2015, implemented the Census-Based, Impact-Oriented Approach, the Care Group Approach, and the Community Birthing Center Approach. Together, this expanded set of approaches is known as CBIO+. This is the fifth of 10 papers in our supplement describing the Project and the effectiveness of the CBIO+ Approach. This paper assesses causes, levels, and risk factors for mortality along with changes in mortality. Methods: The Project maintained Vital Events Registers and conducted verbal autopsies for all deaths of women of reproductive age and under-5 children. Mortality rates and causes of death were derived from these data. To increase the robustness of our findings, we also indirectly estimated mortality decline using the Lives Saved Tool (LiST). Findings: The leading causes of maternal and under-5 mortality were postpartum hemorrhage and pneumonia, respectively. Home births were associated with an eight-fold increased risk of both maternal (p = 0.01) and neonatal (p = 0.00) mortality. The analysis of vital events data indicated that maternal mortality declined from 632 deaths per 100,000 live births in Years 1 and 2 to 257 deaths per 100,000 live birth in Years 3 and 4, a decline of 59.1%. The vital events data revealed no observable decline in neonatal or under-5 mortality. However, the 12–59-month mortality rate declined from 9 deaths per 1000 live births in the first three years of the Project to 2 deaths per 1000 live births in the final year. The LiST model estimated a net decline of 12, 5, and 22% for maternal, neonatal and under-5 mortality, respectively. Conclusion: The baseline maternal mortality ratio is one of the highest in the Western hemisphere. There is strong evidence of a decline in maternal mortality in the Project Area. The evidence of a decline in neonatal and under-5 mortality is less robust. Childhood pneumonia and neonatal conditions were the leading causes of under-5 mortality. Expanding access to evidence-based community-based interventions for (1) prevention of postpartum hemorrhage, (2) home-based neonatal care, and (3) management of childhood pneumonia could help further reduce mortality in the Project Area and in similar areas of Guatemala and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Indigenous Maya women in the rural highlands of Guatemala have traditionally faced constraints to decision-making and participation in community affairs. Anecdotal experiences from previous Curamericas Global projects in Guatemala and Liberia have suggested that interventions using the CBIO+ Approach (which consists of implementing together the Census-Based, Impact-Oriented Approach, the Care Group Approach, and Community Birthing Centers), can be empowering and can facilitate improvements in maternal and child health. This paper, the eighth in a series of 10 papers examining the effectiveness of CBIO+ in improving the health and well-being of mothers and children in an isolated mountainous rural area of the Department of Huehuetenango, explores changes in women's empowerment among mothers of young children associated with the Curamericas/Guatemala Maternal and Child Health Project, 2011–2015. Methods: Knowledge, practice, and coverage (KPC) surveys and focus group discussions (FGDs) were used to explore six indicators of women's empowerment focusing on participation in health-related decision-making and participation in community meetings. KPC surveys were conducted at baseline (January 2012) and endline (June 2015) using standard stratified cluster sampling. Seventeen FGDs (9 with women, 3 with men, 2 with mothers-in-law, and 3 with health committees), approximately 120 people in all, were conducted to obtain opinions about changes in empowerment and to identify and assess qualitative factors that facilitate and/or impede women's empowerment. Results: The KPC surveys revealed statistically significant increases in women's active participation in community meetings. Women also reported statistically significant increases in rates of participation in health-related decision-making. Further, the findings show a dose-response effect for two of the six empowerment indicators. The qualitative findings from FGDs show that the Project accelerated progress in increasing women's empowerment though women still face major barriers in accessing needed health care services for themselves and their children. Conclusion: The Project achieved some notable improvements in women's decision-making autonomy and participation in community activities. These improvements often translated into making decisions to practice recommended health behaviors. Traditional cultural norms and the barriers to accessing needed health services are not easily overcome, even when empowerment strategies are effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In Guatemala, Indigenous women have a maternal mortality ratio over twice that of non-Indigenous women. Long-standing marginalization of Indigenous groups and three decades of civil war have resulted in persistent linguistic, economic, cultural, and physical barriers to maternity care. Curamericas/Guatemala facilitated the development of three community-built, -owned, and -operated birthing centers, Casas Maternas Rurales (referred to here as Community Birthing Centers), where auxiliary nurses provided physically accessible and culturally acceptable clinical care. The objective of this paper is to assess the management of complications and the decision-making pathways of Birthing Center staff for complication management and referral. This is the sixth paper in the series of 10 articles. Birthing centers are part of the Expanded Census-based, Impact-oriented Approach, referred to as CBIO+. Methods: We undertook an explanatory, mixed-methods study on the handling of pregnancy complications at the Birthing Centers, including a chart review of pregnancy complications encountered among 1,378 women coming to a Birthing Center between 2009 and 2016 and inductively coded interviews with Birthing Center staff. Results: During the study period, 1378 women presented to a Birthing Center for delivery-related care. Of the 211 peripartum complications encountered, 42.2% were successfully resolved at a Birthing Center and 57.8% were referred to higher-level care. Only one maternal death occurred, yielding a maternal mortality ratio of 72.6 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. The qualitative study found that staff attribute their successful management of complications to frequent, high-quality trainings, task-shifting, a network of consultative support, and a collaborative atmosphere. Conclusion: The Birthing Centers were able to resolve almost one-half of the peripartum complications and to promptly refer almost all of the others to a higher level of care, resulting in a maternal mortality ratio less than half that for all Indigenous Guatemalan women. This is the first study we are aware of that analyzes the management of obstetrical complications in such a setting. Barriers to providing high-quality maternity care, including obtaining care for complications, need to be addressed to ensure that all pregnant women in such settings have access to a level of care that is their fundamental human right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Curamericas/Guatemala Maternal and Child Health Project, 2011–2015, included implementation research designed to assess the effectiveness of an approach referred to as CBIO+ , composed of: (1) the Census-Based, Impact-Oriented (CBIO) Approach, (2) the Care Group Approach, and (3) the Community Birthing Center Approach. This is the second paper in a supplement of 10 articles describing the implementation research and its findings. Paper 1 describes CBIO+ , the Project Area, and how the Project was implemented. Objective: This paper describes the implementation research design and details of how it was carried out. Methods: We reviewed the original implementation research protocol and the methods used for all data collection related to this Project. The protocol and methods used for the implementation research related to this Project were all standard approaches to the monitoring and evaluation of child survival projects as developed by the United States Agency for International Development Child Survival and Health Grants Program (CSHGP) and the CORE Group. They underwent independent peer review supervised by the CSHGP before the implementation research began. Results: The study area was divided into two sets of communities with a total population of 98,000 people. Project interventions were implemented in Area A from 2011 until the end of the project in 2015 (44 months) and in Area B from late 2013 until 2015 (20 months). Thus, Area B served as a quasi-comparison area during the first two years of Project implementation. The overarching study question was whether the CBIO+ Approach improved the health and well-being of children and mothers. The outcome indicators included (1) changes in population coverage of evidence-based interventions, (2) changes in childhood nutritional status, (3) changes in the mortality of children and mothers, (4) quality of care provided at Community Birthing Centers, (5) the impact of the Project on women's empowerment and social capital, (6) stakeholder assessment of the effectiveness of the CBIO+ Approach, and (7) the potential of wider adoption of the CBIO+ Approach. Conclusion: The implementation research protocol guided the assessment of the effectiveness of the CBIO+ Approach in improving the health and well-being of children, mothers, and their communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Substance use and depressive psychiatric symptoms have been associated with migration and mobility. The Mexico-Guatemala border is a key transit point for internal, regional, and international migration flows. However, there is limited knowledge of the role of substance use, migration, and mobility on mental health among migrants at this border. Our paper explores the association of migration and mobility patterns with possible major depressive symptoms among migrants at this key geographic region. We recruited 392 substance-using migrants using modified time-location sampling. Crude and adjusted logistic regression models were developed. We found that 12% of the sample had possible major depressive symptoms. After adjusting for relevant covariates, including gender, income, and perceived homelessness, we found that recent rural-urban and short-term migrants had higher odds of possible major depressive symptoms, whereas international migrants had lower odds. Findings of this paper suggest that although migrants experience hardship and uncertainty, they may respond with complex and nuanced forms of coping and planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This is the fourth paper in our supplement on improving the health and well-being of rural indigenous Maya mothers and children in the Western Highlands of Guatemala, where the prevalence of stunting is the highest in Latin America and among the highest in the world. Reducing childhood undernutrition was one of the objectives of the Maternal and Child Health Project, 2011–2015, implemented by Curamericas/Guatemala. The implementation research portion of the Project attempted to determine if there were greater improvements in childhood nutritional status in the Project Area than in comparison areas and whether or not a dose–response effect was present in terms of a greater improvement in the Project Area with a longer duration of interventions. Methods: The Project provided nutrition-related messages to mothers of young children, cooking sessions using locally available nutritious foods, a lipid-based nutrient supplement (Nutributter®) for a short period of time (4 months), anti-helminthic medication, and repeated growth monitoring and nutrition counseling. Measures of height and weight for calculating the prevalence of underweight, stunting, and wasting in under-2 children were analyzed and compared with the anthropometric data for children in the rural areas of the Northwestern Region and in the Western Highlands of Guatemala. Results: The prevalence of stunting declined in Area A from 74.5% in September 2012 to 39.5% in June 2015. Area A comprised approximately one-half of the Project Area and was the geographic area with the greatest intensity and duration of nutrition-related Project interventions. Minimal improvements in stunting were observed in the Northwestern Region, which served as a comparison area. Improvements in multiple output and outcome indicators associated with nutritional status were also observed in Areas A and B: infant and young child feeding practices, routine growth monitoring and counseling, and household practices for the prevention and treatment of diarrhea. Conclusion: The Project Area in which Curamericas/Guatemala implemented the CBIO+ Approach experienced a reduction in the prevalence of stunting and other measures of undernutrition in under-2 children. Given the burden of undernutrition in Guatemala and other parts of the world, this approach merits broader application and further evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: While there is extensive published evidence regarding the effectiveness of the Care Group Approach in promoting community-wide health behavior change, there is no published evidence regarding its empowering effect on its participants. Our study aimed to understand if the Care Group Approach as applied in the Curamericas/Guatemala Maternal and Child Health Project in isolated rural mountainous communities in Guatemala produced evidence of empowerment among the female participants. This is the seventh of 10 papers describing the expanded Census-Based, Impact-Oriented (CBIO+) Approach in improving the health and well-being of mothers and children in the rural highlands of the Department of Huehuetenango, Guatemala. Methods: We conducted semi-structured individual and group interviews with 96 female Care Group participants –including Level-1 Care Group Promoters, Care Group Volunteers, and Self-Help Group participants. The participants were from six communities – two from each of the three municipalities making up the Project Area. Data were analyzed both using deductive thematic and by exploring the following social constructs: perceived social status, self-efficacy, decision-making autonomy, and formation of social capital. Results: The findings supported the hypothesis that Care Group participation was an empowering process. The primary themes that emerged included increased respect accorded to women in the community, women's willingness and ability to make decisions and their confidence in making those decisions, and the development of stronger bonds among Care Group members, with other community members, and with community leaders. Conclusion: Through increased theoretical and practical knowledge about important maternal and child health matters and through the social experience of obtaining this knowledge and sharing it with other community members, participation in the Care Group Approach empowered participants to make positive health behavior changes for themselves and for their children and families. This, in turn, led many participants to become more engaged in community activities for improved health and beyond, thereby enhancing social capital in the community. We conclude that the Care Group Approach, as applied in this setting, has made it possible for marginalized indigenous women living in a male-dominated society to become more empowered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I explore the political potentialities the -women's collective in the Mam Maya town of Toj Coman Guatemala open when they bring the historical moment of the Spanish invasion into their present work. I ask, which moments in space and time do women in Toj Coman collectively curate to envision a different future for their community? Drawing on collective members' conversations about textile arts, their construction of a public water tank, and the Spanish invasion, I argue that how these histories are collected and shared unsettles dominant narratives and creates different openings, potentialities, and futures. I draw on insights from 4 months of arts-based collaborative research with the collective between 2018 and 2019 and theorizations of desire, colonial patriarchy, cuerpo-territorio, and refusal by Indigenous and decolonial scholars. I use the word 'curation' to signal the creative and selective ways that women draw on their experience and expertise to carefully both show and deny specific representations, knowledges, and memories across contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. To understand the sexual and reproductive health (SRH) experiences of migrant women and girls of reproductive age (15--49 years) from the Northern Triangle of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras) during their journey to the United States. Methods. A descriptive, qualitative research design included 39 in-depth interviews with migrant women and unaccompanied migrant girls from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras from January to June 2022. Participants were recruited using purposive sampling. Interviews were transcribed, coded and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results. Migrant women and girls lack information and resources to manage their SRH during migration. The SRH of those traveling with smugglers is compromised due to their limited access to menstrual pads, water and sanitation services; the risks of transactional sex and sexual violence; the high risk of sexually transmitted infections; the inability to report sexual violence; the lack of access to SRH and prenatal services; and limited knowledge about their sexual and reproductive rights. Conclusions. There is a significant need for improved interventions during the predeparture phase of migration to inform migrant women and girls about the SRH risks they may encounter and to provide information and resources to support their SRH throughout their journey. Special attention should be directed towards trying to reach girls and women who will travel with smugglers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the use of the grammatical category of person within a specific discursive genre - ceremonial speech. This kind of discourse occurs during traditional offering rituals, which form part of the common Mayan culture. The focus of this study is on the Poqomchi' Maya tradition. There are three major categories of participants in the ritual: spiritual guides, attendees and supernatural beings to whom the invocations are addressed. A linguistic analysis of the word forms that bear person marking and their referents in ceremonial discourse elucidates the specific relations between participants and provides insight into the internal structure of the ritual act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking Guatemala as a case study, this paper reflects on the neoliberal power and knowledge elite. Based on Michael Mann's theory of social power and research on power structure, as well as network analysis, the study explores Guatemala's domestic network of right-wing/neoliberal think tanks and detects the key links and core nuclei within it. Using real data, the analysis reveals the business connections between the staff of these neoliberal think tanks. The paper is thus the first reflection on those in privileged positions of power within the think tank network and the capacity this gives them to establish contacts and transfer knowledge to the fields of economic and ideological power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the processes of meaning-making around femicide in Guatemala, highlighting how particular bodies and spaces are pre-figured as "disposable" through racialised and gendered imaginaries. I draw upon Butlerian epistemologies of violence and indigenous and feminist scholarship from Guatemala and the Americas to analyse why femicides are scripted differently for victims who emerge in "public" spatial formations. Grounded in analysis of the main national newspaper's reporting and the state's regulatory framework around violence, and supplemented with interviews and ethnographic observations that emerged in the context of a high-profile "private" femicide, I argue that "public" victims are read relationally against two subjects who--through reactivated historical scripts of violence--help communicate public victims' disposability. This paper contributes a rich account of the socio-spatial logics informing how bodies matter in Guatemala; more broadly, it emphasises the productive work of states and powerful institutions like media in reinforcing hierarchies between victims of femicide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research explores the host experience of volunteer tourism and presents a case study of local community farmers in the San Miguel Escobar Cooperative near Antigua, Guatemala. In this study, we sought to understand the adoption of role identities by cooperative farmers in their interactions with volunteer tourists and how this affects notions of self and self-esteem. Borrowing from prominent identity scholarship through the last few decades, we examined the proposition that, through the volunteer tourism experience, the host is able to build efficacy- and worth-based self-esteem. Twelve photo elicitation interviews were conducted with coffee-farming members of the Cooperative. Our paper describes and analyzes the farmers' journeys through the various roles they engaged in with the visitors. The hosts' experiences proved to be a journey that bred feelings of nervousness and fear, but positive views of the self and improved self-esteem emerged in the analysis. The results demonstrate the importance of micro-sociological empirical studies of role identities and self-other relationships in volunteer tourism and contributes towards theory building as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dora Belle McLaughlin Burgess was an American Presbyterian missionary, devoted to the mission to the Quiché tribe in Guatemala from 1913 to 1962. During her service, she translated the New Testament from Greek into the Quiché language. She also published a hymnal in Quiché and an ethnographic writing on Quiché culture. This paper attempts to shed light on the life of Dora Burgess, whose work was unknown, and to trace the formation of her identity as a missionary and her mission approach to the native inhabitants. In doing so, the paper argues that her interaction with the native tribes in the mission field shaped her identity as a missionary and her understanding of mission in ways in which the indigenous people's agency and subjectivity were recognised and respected. In the earlier period of her service in Guatemala, Dora Burgess conceived of mission work as a rescue project to transform the native tribes into Christians who would denounce their 'superstitious' traditions; however, her later focus in mission work, especially in her bible translation project, lay in acknowledging the native traditions and cultures and giving the indigenous tribe opportunities to be Christians in their own ways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The objective of this analysis was to present our secondary outcomes (reach, adoption, implementation, maintenance domains) of a prospective trial to test the efficacy of a home-based intervention to increase postpartum contraceptive uptake.Study Design: We executed a cluster-randomized trial to determine if provision of contraception in the home setting increased uptake of postpartum methods. We collected secondary outcomes on how our implementation strategies of revising professional roles and changing service sites performed in terms of the number of people our study enrolled of all women eligible (reach), how it was accepted by the providers (adoption), what methods were used to conduct the study (implementation), and preliminary results on whether or not the intervention will be continued (maintenance). We conducted a survey and focus group discussion to assess adoption and implementation among intervention nurse staff, and a survey in a convenience sample of patients in the intervention arm to assess acceptability.Results: Our primary outcome of effectiveness has been published; implant uptake was 25% in the intervention cohort compared to 3% in the control clusters. Our reach was 89%, as 208 of the 234 eligible women consented to participate. Among a convenience sample of N = 25 patients completing a survey on the intervention 12 months after enrollment, ≥ 68% (n = 17 of 25) felt the intervention was acceptable. From the nursing perspective (N = 7), only a minority of nurses felt the intervention was complicated (n = 1, 17%), and (n = 7, 100%) reported the intervention was acceptable.Conclusions: Our intervention achieved good reach (89% of the eligible population) and was acceptable to the majority of patients and providers. Practitioners interested in achieving greater reach of contraceptive interventions in their communities may consider changing service sites to convenience their clients, as our results suggest this approach was acceptable.Implications: The unique contribution of this paper is in its success with training nurses to insert contraceptive implants during postpartum home visits, which resulted in increased uptake of the contraceptive implant where access to the device was previously limited. Given the trial's successful feasibility and acceptability to both nurses and patients, perhaps this intervention has the potential to be adapted and scaled to other settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From ethnographic research with unaccompanied children in the United States and Guatemala, this paper explores emergent and, at times, conflicting narratives of care that young migrants encounter while in U.S. federal custody. They are depicted as ‘ideal’ victims deserving of care and simultaneously as unauthorized outlaws subject to state discipline via detention and deportation. In contrast, Guatemalan youth and their families speak of migration as a cultural elaboration of care in which they are agents of caregiving, employing transnational migration as a collective and historically-rooted survival strategy. By examining the multiple conceptualizations of care that young people encounter and embody, this paper problematizes theorizations of ‘care’ by tracing the conflicting meanings assigned to it. Informed by the perspectives of young migrants and their families, the paper suggests ways that service providers might better serve them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the first written sources containing information about the Poqomchi' language (Mayan family, Guatemala) is the trilingual Poqomchi'-Spanish-Latin dictionary dating from the beginning of the seventeenth century. Its author was a Dominican missionary, Dionisio de Zúñiga, although his work is based on earlier dictionaries of his predecessors. This paper analyses Zúñiga's dictionary in the context of Dominican evangelizing tradition. Whereas the descriptions of certain lexical entries prove that the author was familiar with the culture and customs of the Poqomchi' people, some other terms, specifically those denoting pre-Columbian deities and native religious concepts, seem to be derived from earlier missionary texts including Domingo de Vico's famous Theologia Indorum. These intertextualities confirm the intellectual continuity among Dominican missionaries in Highland Guatemala during the early colonial period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the textual production of a group of women writers, teachers, and journalists --formed by Vicenta Laparra de la Cerda, Jesús Laparra, Rafaela del Águila, Adelaida J. Chéves, Pilar Larrave de Castellanos, Carmen P. de Silva, and Sara María García Salas de Moreno-- who were active in Guatemala City during the decades of 1880 and 1890. This group of women were authentic pioneers of women's literature in Central America and were also able to connect with some of the most important hemispheric and transatlantic intellectual networks of their time. This paper analyzes the central position that these women writers occupied within the new educational institutions created after the triumph of the Liberal Reform in 1871, in order to evaluate their impact on some of the most important public debates in late-nineteenth-century Guatemala. In particular, it explores a series of texts where these authors criticized the disastrous consequences caused by the overabundance of imported goods in Central American societies that were quickly opening to global markets. I am interested in arguing that these economic texts were a creative response, specifically articulated by women intellectuals, vis-à-vis the tensions and dislocations prompted by regional modernization processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper builds a theory of wait-citizenship, wherein the lack of opportunities for structural inclusion has contributed to young people’s liminal positioning in society and their struggles to become social adults while seeking equality, democratic freedoms, and a sense of belonging. Two decades after civil war, Guatemalan youth are routinely reminded of the fragility of their democracy and instructed not to make demands for inclusive and transformative citizenship. As young people become ‘wait-citizens’ they develop strategies for navigating precarious openings between dangerous actions and coercive structures, often in ways that do not conform to Western, liberal expectations. The paper argues for broader conceptions of civic agency to account for how young people make decisions about exercising their civic voice, particularly in settings where legacies of authoritarianism constrain long-awaited democratic freedoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For centuries the indigenous people of Guatemala have sought ways to preserve identity and defend their communities under repression and systemic inequality and racism. Since the official end of the thirty-six-year armed conflict in the late 1990s, a number of local organizations and political platforms have taken root, with the objective to bring about development that represents local needs and worldviews. In this paper we illustrate the critical work of indigenous organizations in the Maya-Achí territory of Baja Verapaz, in their attempt to carry out development from within. Specifically, we explore the relationships between this form of endogenous development and agroecology, as well as local perspectives of well-being, known as utziil k'asleem. Centered on ancestral principles that include sustainable agricultural production and consumption, reciprocity, commitment to Mother Earth, and contentment with one's work and family, utziil k'asleem provides inspiration to leaders, as well as a path to development focused on cultural recovery and improving quality of life. By analyzing this work, we aim to highlight its importance and transformative potential, while also situating it in the present neoliberal moment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among fish parasitic nematodes Rhabdochona is one of the most speciose genera, with c. 100 species. Twelve congeneric species occur in Mexican freshwater fishes, in a region located between the Nearctic and Neotropical biogeographical regions. Host association and biogeographical history have determined the high species richness of Rhabdochona in Mexico. One of these species, Rhabdochona mexicana , is highly specific to the characid genus Astyanax. Characids are a group of freshwater fish with Neotropical affinity. In this paper, we explore the genetic diversity of R. mexicana through samples obtained from populations of Astyanax spp. across river basins of Mexico and Guatemala. Sequences of one mitochondrial and two ribosomal genes were obtained from 38 individuals and analysed using Maximum Likelihood and Bayesian Inference analysis. Phylogenetic analyses using cox 1, and a concatenated alignment of 18S + 28S + cox 1 recovered two genetic lineages. One of them corresponded with R. mexicana sensu stricto ; this lineage included three reciprocally monophyletic subgroups; the other lineage was highly divergent and represented a putative candidate species. A detailed morphological study was conducted to corroborate the molecular findings. We describe a new species herein and discuss the implications of using molecular tools to increase our knowledge about the diversity of a speciose genus such as Rhabdochona. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Panama are known by the scarce amount of biomedical production. Our aim was to identify barriers to scientific publication and to establish proposals for increasing biomedical investigation in these countries. Methods: An on-line questionnaire was completed by 76 physicians about 4 frameworks. A logistic regression model was done to identify variables associated with the probability of publication. Results: 63 physicians (67.1%; IC 95%: 56.5 - 77.7) have published at least one scientific paper. Most of these publications were case reports (47.4%) and reviews (40.8%). Physicians laboring in private practices (p<0.001) and those specialists in medical oncology or hematology (p=0.02) were more likely to be involved in clinical trials (26.3%). Professional experience, academical degree, and type of medical practice were not related to the number of scientific publications. The majority of physicians finance their projects by their own resources (67.1%). The main limitations were lack of time and human resources (88.2%). The respondents would like to have more time to spend in research (92.1%), and more institutional support (78.9%). They also proposed that external entities should promote their participation in clinical (65.8%) and support academic activities (61.8%). Conclusion: Most of the physicians pointed that lack of human, time, and monetary resources are important barriers to scientific publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine processes of scaling agroecological practices in the Maya-Achí territory of Guatemala. We compare the Achí case to other examples documented in the literature and the key factors, or "drivers," reported as important if not essential for scaling to occur. We find that the Achí scase is complex with regard to these drivers. Factors such as constructivist learning/teaching methods, favorable public policies, and strong social fabric appear to be weak, absent, or even negative. This is due in part to the violence and repression of the 1980s, which resulted in the assassination of 20 percent of the population by the military and paramilitaries, leaving the territory socially fragmented. Projects incorporating agroecology (revalorization of ancestral practices, seed saving, elimination of external inputs, strengthening soil health, increasing/guarding agrobiodiversity) are viewed as a potential strategy to aid in community recovery, and are promoted by local associations as well as by international institutions and NGOs. While social and cultural recuperation were initially hypothesized as primary causes for the adoption of practices, we encounter a range of additional and complex factors, such as the expectation of economic benefits and the presence of aid and development organizations. By analyzing these drivers and barriers we contribute to the ongoing debate over how agroecological practices may be scaled-out, particularly in regions exhibiting less than ideal conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes Rodrigo Rosa's novel El material humano (2009), especially its representation of violence as seen through the author's research on Guatemalan 20th century History. In the novel, the main character searches into the causes of violence in his country, trying to understand the origin of the conflict. However, his work ends in a triple failure: a cognitive, an aesthetic and an ethical one. That failure, as this paper proposes, represents a whole series of stories about the tragedy of historical memory in Latin America and Spain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Central American countries, particularly Guatemala, are experiencing extreme climate events which are disproportionately affecting agriculture and subsequently rural livelihoods. Governments are taking action to address climatic threats, but they need tools to assess the impact of policies and interventions aiming to decrease the impacts of climate change on agriculture. This research, conducted with national policy makers and climate change and agriculture stakeholders in Guatemala, provides a comparative analysis of eight climate-smart agriculture (CSA) practices and technologies associated with the smallholder maize-beans production system in the Dry Corridor. The practices were identified as high-interest for investment by national stakeholders. CSA practices and technologies aim to improve food security, resilience, and low emissions development, where possible and appropriate. The paper assesses the cost-benefit profile of the introduction of CSA options into farm production systems. Indicators related to profitability and valuation of environmental and social externalities are used to assess options. Probabilistic cost-benefit analysis (CBA) is used to address field variability and high uncertainty around parameter values. All practices except one were profitable over their lifecycle, with some practices, expected to be ideal for drought prone areas, presenting a higher risk for adoption. The results were discussed with national stakeholders who established best-bet CSA investment portfolios. This paper argues that a thorough understanding of the costs and benefits of potential CSA options is needed to channel investments effectively and efficiently towards both short- and long-term interventions and should be coupled with broader assessment of tradeoffs between CSA outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the long‐term ties between security, development, and fear in Guatemala. I argue that as the development apparatus in Guatemala has long been structured around violence and security concerns, development encounters in the contemporary era continue to be shaped by fear. The confluence of multiple mechanisms of fear, including the legacies of violence, surveillance, and coercion, structure development encounters in profound ways. Drawing on semistructured interviews with development practitioners, I examine their perceptions of fear's impact on development encounters at the local level to highlight the problematic culture of fear rhetoric, which serves to obscure practices through which lived experiences of fear are reproduced. Emphases on social cohesion, solidarity, and behaviors which "better contribute" to development work to mask the racialized elements of these discourses and ultimately serve to silence and delegitimize indigenous demands for structural change and justice in the country [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the dynamics of racialized securitization for transnational migrants across multiple borders—from Central America toward Mexico and the United States. Rather than a singular process where US policies, funding, and attitudes toward border security direct Mexican immigration enforcement, I argue that Mexican state collaboration redirects US xenophobia away from Mexican migrants and toward Central American migrants. Migrants' testimonies point to the ways that US and Mexican discourses are mobilized in different—but complementary—ways that shape them as racialized subjects with differential life chances. This is clearest through a crude mapping of people onto nationalities for deportation based on hair, language, and tattoos. Beyond legal violence, deported migrants describe their vulnerability as constructed within tacit networks of collaboration between actors in the US and Mexico, both licit and illicit, in an effort to extort migrants and their families. While race is a key signifier in border securitization, the differences between these racial states have material consequences in the differential state violence in immigration enforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]