UC Santa Cruz

This dissertation is a multi-layered interpretation of Oaxacans’ own words, embodiments, and processes for discussing inequalities, trauma, profound sadness, susto (fright), and healing processes. The research methods I employed from 2017-2020 include archival research, ethnographic interviews with sixty-five Oaxacans, and participant observation of seventeen healing practices in Oaxaca, Mexico. The intersectional framework of my research considers the forms by which Oaxacans may experience multiple layers of marginalization or privilege based on their ethnicity, migration experience, class, and gender. This study addresses structural inequalities that exclude Oaxacan perspectives about wellness. My research identifies intercultural inequality in the institutional acts of touting multicultural diversity. These acts do little to grant the autonomy of Indigenous communities (that represent a large demographic) in Oaxaca.

My argument is twofold. I argue that transborder affect prompts discussion of lived experiences and global inequalities beyond the control of Oaxacans. I also argue that Oaxacans apply Indigenous intercultural knowledge (manifested through language, rituals, territorial relationships, and local resources) to embody historical and contemporary emotional woes. This twofold argument explains how Zapotec, Mixtec, and intercultural communities perceive wellness and how these communities create forms of healing proportionate with available and useful mediums of communication. My work considers how ancestral healing practices that ground rituals could supplement conventional mental health services and enable the development of a culturally responsive practice for easing the emotional wounds associated with the effects of migration and gender violence.

My interventions are also two-fold. At the community level, my research proposes more humane ways for mental health professionals, health institutions, individuals, and families to understand the emotional processes and healing practices of marginalized groups enduring hardships linked to social and global inequalities. At the academic level, my dissertation contributes to the anthropological, sociological, Latin American and Latinx studies literature on development inequality, emotional health, and Indigenous feminist concepts of healing. My dissertation offers frameworks for thinking about mental health beyond pathologies and provides insight on contemporary individual and collective emotional injuries through concepts of interconnectivity and Indigenous healing epistemologies.