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Abstract:
This thesis project is composed of two parts: a research portion and a series of four paintings researched, created and described by the author as a response to the violence that the Indigenous peoples of the Pipil/Nahuat/Maya nation of El Salvador underwent in the 1930s. Chapter one is composed of research about the 1932 genocide in which the nation state of El Salvador, headed by the dictator Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez, massacred over 30,000 Indigenous people in western El Salvador. The late 1800s up to the Massacre of 1932 signaled a period of dramatic transfer of land from Indigenous to non-native hands. This thesis's primary objective is to reveal that, violence during this time period was used to advance capitalist and racial agendas and aided in further destabilizing a space for Indigenous sovereignty in the years to come. The author makes a relationship between the Manifest Destiny agenda of North American settlers and the genocidal agenda of the Martinez’s government of 1930s Nation State of El Salvador. This work adds on to the Indigenous experiences to explain and address violence, cross-generational trauma and its residual effects. Chapter 2 describes four paintings that stem out of these violent historic experiences. The paintings incorporate Maya-Pipil oral tradition, historical revisionism, and testimonies of the 1932 and 1980s survivors to reclaim a space for Native visual sovereignty.
fair-use copyright Alicia Siu
for complete transcript of thesis please contact Alicia at: [email protected]
This thesis project is composed of two parts: a research portion and a series of four paintings researched, created and described by the author as a response to the violence that the Indigenous peoples of the Pipil/Nahuat/Maya nation of El Salvador underwent in the 1930s. Chapter one is composed of research about the 1932 genocide in which the nation state of El Salvador, headed by the dictator Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez, massacred over 30,000 Indigenous people in western El Salvador. The late 1800s up to the Massacre of 1932 signaled a period of dramatic transfer of land from Indigenous to non-native hands. This thesis's primary objective is to reveal that, violence during this time period was used to advance capitalist and racial agendas and aided in further destabilizing a space for Indigenous sovereignty in the years to come. The author makes a relationship between the Manifest Destiny agenda of North American settlers and the genocidal agenda of the Martinez’s government of 1930s Nation State of El Salvador. This work adds on to the Indigenous experiences to explain and address violence, cross-generational trauma and its residual effects. Chapter 2 describes four paintings that stem out of these violent historic experiences. The paintings incorporate Maya-Pipil oral tradition, historical revisionism, and testimonies of the 1932 and 1980s survivors to reclaim a space for Native visual sovereignty.
fair-use copyright Alicia Siu
for complete transcript of thesis please contact Alicia at: [email protected]
