Courage Tastes of Blood: The Mapuche Community of Nicolás Ailío and the Chilean State, 1906–2001 by Florencia E. Mallon (review)

176 The Latin Arnericanist Fall 2006 such as Aljovin de Losada take a more top-down approach. Aljovin de Losada explores political traditions that developed among political elites and incorporated into AndrCs Santa Cruz’s semiauthoritarian Bolivian-Peruvian Confederation (1836-1839). His chapter sheds a critical light on the wide array of options available to nation-building projects in the wake of independence, referring to the first decades of republicanhistory as a “political laboratory” (p. 96). Also of value are chapters by MargaritaGanido andAline Helg on the frequently overlooked independence period. Helg’s essay, for example, describes the race and class politics that grew out of the broader independence interests and shaped Colombia’s national identity away from a Caribbean-Afroto an ‘Andeanized’mestizo version. Helg’s conclusions are indicative of the sorts of political jockeying that transcended the independence conflict and the ensuing, long-term repercussions it engendered. For the twentieth century, Brook Larson and Laura Gotkowitz provide provocative new insights into elite conceptions of race and citizenship and the ways that indigenous communities manipulated these conceptions for their own benefit in the decades preceding the 1952Bolivian revolution. In all, the authors are successful in identifying the dynamic and oftentimes competing political processes that defined and redefined nation building and state building in the Andes. They provide useful examples that can be contrasted with other regions in Latin America. It is precisely this pragmatic yet original approach that makes Political Cultures in the Andes a must-read for Andeanists or anyone interested in the processes that have characterized the region’s political traditions. Javier F: Marion Emrnanuel College, Boston Courage Tastesof Blood: TheMapuche Community of Nicolas Ailio andthe Chileanstate, 1906-2001. ByFlorenciaE.Mallon. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005, p. 319, $22.95. The Mapuche, Chile’s largest indigenous group, have a unique historical experience due to their long resistance to subjugation . When the War of Arauco (1536 - 1881)finally ended and the Mapuche people were integrated into the Chilean population, most Mapuche territory was incorporated into the Chilean state. While Eduardo Frei’s governmentreturned small amounts of land during the 1964agrarianreform, many Mapuche communitylead- Book Reviews I77 ers began a significantstrugglefor land restitution that was exceptional both in its processes and results. The story of how Mapuche communities have resettled and struggled to reclaim land from the Chilean state is not often included in the narrative of Chilean history; however, Florencia E. Mallon, professor of Modern Latin American History at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, has written a detailed account of one Mapuche community’s twentieth -century experience.In Courage Tasteso f Blood: TheMapuche Community ofNicola’sAilio and the Chilean State, I906 - 2001, Mallon combines formal research with oral histories to illustrate this community’s experience with the Chilean state and the issue of land restitution. Mallon’s account of the Nicolas Ailio community is from research and interviews she conducted from 1996 to 2001. In order to find a particular case in which the documentation was the most fascinating and due to a desire to get to know the history of a Mapuche community that had collaborated with the Revolutionary Peasant Movement [MovimientoCampesino Revolucionario, MCR] during the Popular Unity government of SalvadorAllende, Mallon researched different Mapuche communities at the Asunto Indigenas archivein Temuco, Chile. Mallon chose the community of Nicolis Ailio because of the extreme nature of its case. Mallon foundthatNicolis Ailioexperienceda more severelevelof poverty than other Mapuche communities due to continued usurpation of lands and subsequent degradation of the remaining lands. In addition , the Nicolis Ailio community’s severe situation and drastic measures became a model for other Mapuche communities.While Mallon begins the story in 1970during the community’stakeover of a landed estate, she began to research Nicolis Ailio in 1996,the same year the community was finally able to purchase a landed estate with a land subsidy from the Chilean government. The communitywas foundedby a Mapuche cacique [leader], Nicolas Ailio, who acquired a land-grant title [titulo de merced] from the Chilean government in Puerto Saavedra in 1906. Even though the community’sland title was granted by the Chileangovernment , sections of the land began to be usurped by local landowners as early as 1908...