(IN)DEFENSE OF THE LAND

(In)Defense of the Land analyzes the relationship between biodiversity and linguistic diversity as two interrelated phenomena resulting from extractivism. Taking as a premise that the displacement of Indigenous, Afrodiasporic, and rural populations by the advancement of the extractive frontier has resulted in the loss of ancestral ecological knowledge conveyed in those communities’ languages, I show how contemporary poets writing in Guna, Garifuna, Guaraní, Maya K’iche’, Náhuatl, Ngäbe and Yucatec Maya advocate for the preservation of the biodiversity of Abiayala.