A collection of essays on the construction and emergence of ethnic identities in the Ecuadorian Andes, edited by Marc Becker. The authors of the volume examine Afro-Ecuadorians and indigenous communities through the lens of politics, culture, religion, gender, and the environment to better understand the array of social problems facing the country.

French sociologist Manuela Picq explores the role of women leadership in resistance movements from the nineteenth-century independence movements to the contemporary social struggles at work today. Historian Jean Hall looks at the inclusion of Afro-Ecuadorians in the reform government of Rafael Correa from 2007, and other authors examine issues of mestizo identity formation, the destruction of highland forests and the rise of flower exports in the central highlands.

This work is important because of its use of a wide variety of historical narratives to explain contemporary social struggle, each of which broadens the historiography of this unique nation in the South American Andes.

Citation
Becker, Marc, ed. Indigenous and Afro-Ecuadorians Facing the Twenty-First Century. Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013.

By N. H. Gill
Chapel Hill, 2016