The Xaripu Community across Borders: Labor Migration, Community, and Family

3 A Social-Historical Context of Xaripu’s Land Displacement and Labor Migration Experience

63 chapter three a social-historical conteXt of Xaripu’s land displaceMent and laBor Migration eXperience Xaripu, my ancestral pueblo, has changed tremendously over the centuries: from a Purépecha center to a “Mexican” pueblo. My grandfather elias, during one of our last visits before he passed away in october 1991, told me, Mi abuela era tarasca1 y no hablaba español (my grandmother was Purépecha and did not speak spanish). His father, Pomposo Barajas, wore calzon de indio (indigenous trousers), and his mother, Bartola Muratalla, was from san antonio Guaracha, which was known to have relied on african slaves during the colonial period. indigenous and mestiza/o (a mix of Black and White) ancestry are part of Xaripus’ heritage, though the indigenous prevalence is documented in church and public records2 and also evident in their appearance, language , and customs. While influenced and altered by major historical events, their collective identity as Xaripus remains strong: their indigenous heritage, which has blended with other ethnic influences, distinguishes them from their surrounding communities in Michoacán. this chapter examines the social history of Xaripu and traces the transformations experienced by Xaripu across time. i provide the socialhistorical context that contributed to their migration patterns in both Mexico and the United states and also examine their incorporation as a racialized people into a global labor market and society. 64 the Xaripu community across Borders origins of Xaripus Xaripu3 is a pueblo in the northwest region of Michoacán, Mexico, whose history predates the modern nations of both Mexico and the United states. three distinct peoples occupied the lands surrounding present-day Xaripu—the Purépechans inhabited the geographical area along today’s central-western state of Michoacán by the Pacific ocean, the Mexicas occupied the eastern and southern areas bordering Michoac án, and the chichimec tribes dominated the northern areas (López 1981). Xaripu lies southeast of Xiquilpa and southwest of Xacona, {and it appears in both abraham ortelio’s 1579 map of new spain, “theatrum orbis terrarum” (see Figure 1 in the appendix), and theodoro de Bry’s 1595 “americae Pars Quinta.”4 (the presence of Xaripu on these historical maps is important since the pueblo is not typically shown on modern maps.) the Purépechans had linguistic and cultural practices that were distinct from the nahuas (chichimeca/Mexica), who dominated Mesoamerica (Wolf 1959, 41–44; De la coruña 1539/1541, xiii), though there are evident links between their culture and both southern and northern indigenous people (Wolf 1959, 44; Pollard 1993, 8–9; Warren 1985, 8). For example, their metal art and use of tools were similar to those of the Quechuas from Peru and columbia. a sixteenth-century account notes that they were especially advanced with “welding, alloying, casting, soldering , and plating,” and their work with copper was particularly sophisticated at a time when metal work was unusual in Mesoamerica (De la coruña 1539/1541, xiii–xiv). this technology possibly helped them successfully defend themselves against the Mexicas several times in the centuries before european colonialism. Purépechans also shared linguistic forms with the Quechuas from Peru and the Zunis from new Mexico (De la coruña 1539/1541, xiv;Warren 1985, 4), and resembled their chichimecan neighbors’ ethnographic characteristics (Warren 1985, 8).5 the ties between the Purépechans and the nahuas are described in the sixteenth-century Relación de Michoacán (the chronicles of Michoac án).the Relación tells of taríacuri—who was born to a Purépechan mother and a chichimecan (nahua) father—unifying Michoacán’s Pu- Xaripu’s Land Displacement and Labor Migration experience 65 répechan core and expanding its territory into periphery zones (De la coruña 1539/1541, 113–20, 133). Between 1250 and 1350 ce taríacuri and later descendents secured the Pátzcuaro basin (the core), which served as Michoacán’s political and military center (Pollard 1993, 88–91). its periphery areas became tributary lands overseen by caciques (local administrators), which included teco, otomi, and chichimecan settlements (Pollard 1993, 92–105). Purépechans gradually resettled from the core to the periphery to integrate and secure the newly acquired territory in Mexica areas. as Pollard (1993, 103) documents, “such resettlements are known to have occurred from Jacona to Jiquilpan, to tarecuato, and to Periban. . . . smaller resettlements are known to have been made within the heartland and along the military borders, apparently...