Past Event

The Feminist Futures Speaker Series is eager to present: Kemenik Natajsaj Qach’ob’oj Chirij le Xib’inel / Weaving to Remember Our Ghost Stories: A Queer and Trans Memoria Historíca of the Guatemalan Civil War, a presentation by Dr. Andrés C. López that will take place at #2017 Dunton Tower on November 16th, 2022 (10am-11:30am).

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“This presentation is part of a larger memoria histórica of the Guatemalan Civil War that centers queer and trans Maya people in its imaginings. Using Maya backstrap weaving practices, “constellating” as defined by the Cultural Rhetorics Theory Lab, and ghost stories as a Maya-centered queer/trans rhetorical methodology, I argue for a shift from Eurocentric frameworks to a Maya-centered paradigm in how histories of the Guatemalan Civil War and the Guatemalan diaspora have been written by scholars and historiographers. The Maya-centered queer/trans rhetorical methodology I use throughout argues for a historicizing practice centered on Indigenous sovereignty and locally specific Indigenous paradigms and frameworks to stop the erasure of Indigenous peoples from collective consciousness and canons.”     

About the Speaker:

Dr. Andrés C. López (he/him or they/them) is an Afro-Indio-Jamaican-Guatemalan-Trans-Queer scholar. They’re an Assistant Professor in the School of Indigenous and Canadian Studies at Carleton University. His interdisciplinary work centers Indigenous and Black feminist theorizing and methodologies, and encompasses historiography, Cultural Rhetorics, and Queer Indigenous Two-Spirit Studies. Their research uses a Maya backstrap weaving methodology to rewrite active memory recouperations of the Guatemalan Civil War and bring Maya queer and trans ancestors, who might be erased from physical archives as well as from larger collective memories, back into community.

About the Feminist Futures Speaker Series:

The Feminist Futures Lecture Series offers presentations of current feminist research being carried out by faculty associated with the Institute. Drawing from the rich interdisciplinary, intersectional research environment that marks past work and frames future endeavors, the Feminist Futures Lecture Series continues the development of critical intellectual and political spaces and knowledge-building around gendered issues. In this friendly but critically engaged space, you are invited to connect with a community of scholar-activists associated with the Feminist Institute of Feminist Transformation at Carleton University.