A team of Chilean archaeologists linked to the Universidad Católica del Norte and the Institute of Archaeological Investigations and Padre Le Paige Museum of San Pedro de Atacama (Chile) visited the municipality of A Pobra do Brollón yesterday. These entities publish one of the most prestigious scientific journals in Latin American archaeology, the magazine Estudios Atacameños: Journal of South Andean Archeology and Anthropology.
The researchers who visited the municipality, Valentina Figueroa, Fernanda Kalazich, Manuel Prieto and Lautaro Núñez, work in one of the most important World Heritage areas in the world, the Atacama Desert. This team is integrated into the project International Network of Critical Studies of the Cultural Heritage of the Atacama Desert funded by the Chilean government for the years 2018 and 2019. This project aims to examine the processes of construction and heritage discourses that emerge from Archaeology and political ecology in a comparative perspective, between Spain and Chile. The Spanish partner of this project is the Institute of Heritage Sciences of the CSIC in which it is integrated, Xurxo Ayán, director of the archaeological project of the San Lourenzo castro, who had already worked in Atacama in 2013.
Within the framework of this project, the militarized spaces of the border between Bolivia and Chile, the saltpeter and copper mining landscape, the historical memory of the Chilean dictatorship and pre-Hispanic archaeological sites are studied. Hence the interest of this team in learn about the pioneering projects in Archaeology of the Recent Past developed in A Pobra do Brollón, such as the guerrilla Archaeology project in Repil.
The Chilean visitors also learned about the project of Archaeology in the Community of the San Lourenzo fort, which is based on the Chilean experience in the field of indigenous archaeology.
This Chilean group is the second American archaeological team to visit Pobra do Brollón; the first were the professors of the University of Binghamton (USA),Randy Mcguire and Ruth Van Dycke, in July of this year.
The Galician team will travel to Chile in November to give courses and conferences. In 2019, it will participate in the Workshop international Critical Heritage Studies.
