Peripheral Landscapes on the Borders of Empire, Nation-State, and Extractivism: Colombia’s Wild Northeast

This paper explores the history of Colombia’s indigenous Wayuu in the Guajira Peninsula, who from the peripheries of Spanish colonialism and the Colombian nation-state have participated in and resisted transnational economic development projects from the slave trade and pearl diving to the world’s largest open-pit coal mine.  The region’s natural environment attracted outside attention, and offered local peoples the ability to engage with and challenge the incursions of outsiders. 

The harsh environment deterred conquest, but nevertheless fascinated outsiders eager for resources from pearls to souls to coal.  Location—peripheral to centers of state power but central to strategic Caribbean trade—also facilitated both separateness and connection.

During the colonial period, the Wayuu adopted Spanish weapons, horses, goats and cattle, and used these to resist Spanish government and religion.  They participated in the slave trade and assimilated escaped slaves.  They participated in and sometimes controlled pearl diving and trade.  They collaborated with Spain’s British and Dutch enemies to maintain their political autonomy.  After centuries of failure, Catholic missionaries made significant inroads in the early twentieth century, and Protestant evangelicals in the late century.  The coal industry, starting in the 1970s, flooded the region with foreign investment, technology, and contamination.

My paper highlights an environmental perspective on the interactions between local and transnational histories in this borderland and crossroads.