Stained stories: an anti-genealogy of the concept of the "multifarious" (abigarrado) in the Andean region

Abstract

In the 1980’s, the sociologist René Zavaleta Mercado proposed reconstructing the contemporary history of Bolivia. In his project, he argued that Bolivia was not a nation because it was characterized by a “multifarious socio-economic system”. It comprised a superposition of historical stages, conceptions of the world, production modes and structures of self-government. In this essay we recover the concept of the multifarious (lo abigarrado) to think about the heterogeneity of the capital city of the province of Salta, which borders Bolivia, Chile and Paraguay. This uniqueness requires us to draw new maps that go beyond the official maps of the nation-State and that take into account the reintroduction of intercultural experiences. In this context, Salta –in the northwest of Argentina– connects with the Andean region. This prompts us to construct analytical categories that can describe the uniqueness of the social processes from a regional perspective. The proposal of an “anti-genealogy”–in reference to the metaphor of the rhizome of Deleuze and Guattari -- allows us to outline the methodological-theoretical discussions of the concept of the multifarious [abigarrado] that organizes texts, authors, questions and research.