Garcia Antrhopology Now - Sept 2010 2-2 (1)

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anthropology NOW September 2010 Volume 2 Number 2

From Honey to Ashes: In Memory of Claude Levi-Strauss

FEATURES

A Fieldnote on Shame

Lucas Bess/re

Icons of the Desert

Ruti Talmor

Super Guinea Pigs?

Maria Elena Garcia22

My Bun, Her Oven

Elly Teman

The Red General

Andrew Bickford

33

42

DEPARTMENTS

Conversations

Questions for Claude Levi-Strauss

Channeled by Susan Harding52

Findings

CUNY Graduate School Collective:

Martha Lincoln, Michael Poison, Sophie Statzel,

John Warner, Risa Cramer, Chris Grove, and Carwil lames55

a ii thropology

Volume 2 Number 2

GENERAL EDITOR

Katherine McCaffrey Montclair State University

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Emily Martin New York University

Ida Susser City University of New York

Susan Harding University of California, Santa Cruz

BOOK REVIEW EDITOR

Shirley Lindenbaum City University of New York

HIM REVIEW EDITOR

Noelle Stout New York University

EDITORIAL HOARD

Don Brenneis University of California, Santa Cruz

Joe Dumit University of California, Davis

Louise Lamphere University of New Mexico

George Marcus University of California, Irvine

Frances E. Mascia-Lees Rutgers University

Mary Murrell University of California. Berkeley

Lorna Rhodes University of Washington

Dan Segal Pitzer College

irmORIAI A'SISVANIS

Angela Orlando University of California, Los AngelesWill Thomson New York University

Amiel Melnick City University of New York

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Super Guinea Pigs?

Maria Elena Garcia

ft was unusually cold in Cusco as wewaited for Oscar. He arrived just after 5

a.m., and we jumped in the car, eager to be-gin our journey. Oscar had offered to takemy husband Tony and me to a local organiccuy (guinea pig) farm. This farm raised cuyesexclusively for the Inka Grill where Oscarworked, one of the best-known restaurantsin Cusco. Guinea pigs have been a foodsource for local Andean communities forcenturies, but their ubiquitous presence infancy restaurants where they are consumedby wealthy Peruvians—as well as U.S.,European, Japanese, and Latin Americantourists—is new.

We drove past military checkpoints to-ward a small town approximately threehours away. The farm was located in a fertileinter-Andean valley. Stunning views of An-dean hills framed two frolicking puppies,who playfully approached the recently cre-ated trout pond, looking at don Wilbert, theowner of the farm, and the hundreds ofguinea pigs housed here. In a large, clean,enclosed area, guinea pigs of all sizessquealed and huddled toward the back oftheir pens as we walked into the enclosure.The very friendly and welcoming donWilbert proudly showed off his cuyes,pointing to those who were especiallyplump, or pregnant. A few weeks earlier, Ihad spoken with the head chef at the Inka

<tntliropolo;>y vow

Grill who assured me that their cuy meatcame from exclusively local, organic farms,where the animals were well taken care of.These cuyes did look healthy and seemed tobe living in clean pens, with plenty of hay.But this group of cuyes would provide onlya small portion of those prepared at the InkaGrill, and the Inka Grill is only one of hun-dreds of restaurants catering to tourists,backpackers, and others for whom consum-ing guinea pig and other "authentically Pe-ruvian" animals was a significant dimensionof their Peruvian experience. I wonderedwhere the millions of cuyes who are con-sumed in Peru each year were raised andslaughtered. Were their lives as "good" asthe lives of the guinea pigs in don Wilbert'sfarm? What about the thousands of alpacasthat, over the past several years, have be-come increasingly prominent in menusthroughout Cusco and Lima?

In recent years, traditional Andean ani-mals like guinea pigs, alpacas, and llamashave come to represent new commercialopportunities across the Americas. Whilethe industrialization of agriculture and theexport of animals as commodities are not

Guinea pigs at organic farm near Cusco (photo by author)

Volume 2. Number 2 . September 2010

new phenomena 'in Latin America, theseparticular animals^were previously not con-sidered globally marketable. Andean coun-tries are experiencing a political-economicmoment in whic^ "tradition" has becomean economic asset, made apparent by aboom in nouveau-Andean cuisine, and inthe discourses of tourist and developmentagencies. In fine restaurants in Lima andCusco, it is increasingly common to find al-paca meat, something that would have beeninconceivable a decade ago, when alpacameat was only found in remote highland in-digenous communities and towns. Similarly,in Bolivia, filet mignon de llama is a popu-lar entree in exclusive restaurants, eventhough the idea of selling the meat of thispack animal was almost unthinkable, and,until very recently, illegal.

What impact does the commercializationof Andean animals have on indigenous peo-ples, animals, and development policies inthe Andean region? How do Andean ani-mals fare in the relatively new industrialfarms and slaughterhouses quickly spread-ing throughout the Andes?

Exporting "Authentic" Peru

We arrived in Lima one cold winter day inJune 2009. That evening, one of our closestfriends invited us to his home for dinner. Wehad been his dinner guests many times be-fore. Usually he and his wife preparedsomething simple and not Peruvian. Thistime, the meal featured distinctly Peruvianingredients like huacatay (Peruvian blackmint) and chirimoya (fruit native to the An-des). The carefully prepared meal had an un-

Mana Elena Garcfa

Acurio has spearheaded... agastronomic revolution, primarilythrough the development of cocinanmmandina, featuring indigenous

Peruvian products.

usual gourmet flare. More a nouveau An-dean fusion than traditional Peruvian fare,the risotto de huacatay and manjar de chiri-moya were a delicious and labor-intensivewelcome. Quickly, the conversation turnedto food, the Peruvian gastronomic boom,and the rise of Gastdn Acurio—Peru's topchef and the best-known man in the country.Born in Lima, Acurio left Peru to study culi-nary arts in Madrid and Paris. Since his re-turn to Peru in the mid-1990s, Acurio hasspearheaded what he calls a gastronomicrevolution, primarily through the develop-ment of cocina novoandina, featuring in-digenous Peruvian products. According toour hosts, Acurio's gastronomic revolutionwas one of the few things bringing Peru andPeruvians together—this included not onlyPeruvians in Peru, but in the global diasporaas well. Acurio, they said, was pushing theboundaries of class, culture, and geographyin a move to reconstitute the nation. Ourfriends insisted on this analysis despite ourskepticism, citing Acurio's famous televisioncooking show, Aventura Culinaha (A Culi-nary Adventure), as more than sufficientproof.' In the show, Acurio travels to coastalbeaches, highland communities, and junglebungalows; he visits working-class neigh-borhoods and high-end restaurants, always

Super Guinea I'ijfs? 23

in search of "the best" Peruvian meal or in-gredient. "He may find the best tamal in asmall town in the north on his show oneweek, and Limenos will go there to taste itthe next week!" our friends exclaimed, lusta few weeks before we arrived in Peru, Acu-rio had discovered that the best anticucho(grilled beef heart, served on a skewer) wasprepared by a female street vendor in Limawhose street cart was located in a workingclass part of the city. The day following Acu-rio's announcement on his show, some ofthe wealthiest Limenos were lined up intheir SUVs, waiting to try these now famousanticuchos. These wealthy adventurers andlovers of Peru drove across class lines anddared to wait in line, comfortably insidetheir cars. Interestingly, the news focusednot on the delicious anticuchos, but ratheron the vendor's refusal to move to a differ-ent, "cleaner," locale, as reporters and in-creasingly frustrated consumers asked herto. For our friends, this story was an exam-ple of the democratization of Peruvian soci-ety. In my view, however, this anecdote actu-ally highlights the uneven and contradictoryencounters of culture and class.

Acurio's success goes beyond the bor-ders of Peru, and what he exports is morethan Peruvian cuisine and its ingredients.He also exports a vision of Peru that goesbeyond the familiar representations portray-ing it as mystical, indigenous, and exotic. Inhis restaurants, from Cusco to San Fran-cisco, Acurio transforms "lo Peruano" into acasually elegant aesthetic experience that isdecidedly cosmopolitan—for those whocan afford to pay for it. Moreover, Acuriosuggests that Peruvian kitchens and restau-rants have no need to envy the West or

24 a?i!hropoloj;> vm

Roasted guinea pig (photo by Andrew Nienhat

North; all that's been lacking is the rightrepresentation of Peruvian food, somethingthat comes with the comfortable, clean, andelegant spaces that Acurio's restaurants,books, and television shows offer.

Novoandino cuisine represents an ex-portable and sophisticated version of whatpreviously was seen as local and backward.There is a kind of economic and culturalalchemy at work: Gaston transforms whathe finds in shantytowns into the glossy stuffof Gourmet magazine. One of Acurio'sfriends tells the readers of Gourmet that theidea of gourmet Andean food was, not longago, a contradiction in terms. People incoastal Lima saw the food of the Andes aspeasant food. "When I grew up, if you ateguinea pig you were a savage," he declares(Fraser 2006). Those savages, of course,were highland indigenous peoples. Such acomment reflects the dominant understand-ing of the racial geography of Peru. In thisgeography, Lima represents Peru's link tothe promise of Western modernity ("in an-other ten years," says Acurio, "Lima will belike Paris, people will come here just toeat"). The Andes is represented in the best ofcases as the home of "mystical" Machu Pic-

Volume 2 - Number 2 • September 2010

chu, and in the worst of cases, indigenoussavagery (Vich 2007). The success of GastonAcurio and the overwhelming attraction ofthe Andes to millions of tourists who cometo Peru every year indicate that "Peru" is it-self becoming a rrtore successful commod-ity, for those who have the income to pur-chase the "export-quality" Peru.

Marketing Ethics:Social Justice through Food

Many Limenos respond to the critique thatGaston is only for rich people or tourists bypointing to Acurio's emphasis on social jus-tice. After all, Acurio is no stranger to themarginal parts of the country and has gener-ated tremendous good will by opening culi-nary institutions for the training of newchefs in poor neighborhoods. But for Acu-rio, social justice goes hand in hand withentrepreneurial success: "Gastronomy andhunger simply do not go together. It is im-moral to enjoy good food and lavish mealswhen you know that the fisherman whocaught your divinely cooked seafood livesin a shabby hut and must survive on next tonothing" (Acurio 2009). Acurio is outspokenabout the responsibility to eliminate dis-crimination and exploitation. He describesone of the schools he opened, in a shanty-town in the north of Lima, as much morethan a cooking school:

A total of 200,000 people live there, more

than 50 percent of whom are minors.

There is a water shortage and electricity

was installed only recently. In our pro-

gram, cooking is combined with learning

Marfa Elena Garcia

the moral principles that are fundamental

in the development of a democratic soci-

ety. ... Many of the students want to con-

tinue their studies abroad, but consider it

their duty to return to Peru after that. They

know that chefs are now role models in

our country (Acurio 2009).

With its emphasis on beneficiaries, moralprinciples, education for a democratic soci-ety, income-generating strategies, and senseof duty, this description might be more fit-ting for a development program than acooking school. However, this seems to beAcurio's point: food is development. Intraining new generations of chefs, Acurio ishelping consolidate the place of Peruvianfood in an economic vision which will in-still pride in local traditions and resourceswhile simultaneously attracting the attentionand money of the world.

Acurio is the new face of socially andenvironmentally conscious capitalism. Hisphilosophy suggests a human-centered at-tention to detail, although profit, of course,

Preparing cuy in Cusco (photo by author).

Super (iuiiion I'itis? 25

Eating cuy in Cusco (pholo by author).

fits in as well. The Acurio approach, as heputs it, is to "use the best products possible,buy product daily, keep the best people, allthe chefs, all the managers, keep them inthe organization—and that is the core ofwhat we do. But if it is possible to use tech-nology or techniques to achieve thosethings, we use them" (Acurio 2006). Innova-tion and technology are needed, in Acurio'sview, for Peruvian cuisine to "take off" andbecome a world cuisine. "Right now thereare about 500 Peruvian restaurants in theworld. What we would like to see is that ex-pand to 200,000 in the next 20 years." Sucha statement does not exactly signal a Mc-Donalds-style ambition, but it neverthelessreveals a global push for markets and cus-tomers, which raises important questions.As the scale of the Peruvian food industrygrows, what are the implications for the lo-cal producers? Will the definition of "bestproducts" be changed to maximize profitmargins? And, returning to the question thatmotivated this research in the first place,what does this novoandino boom mean for

26 anthropoloj>> NOW

the animals that are seen as the ingredientsof the culinary revolution?

Transnational Guinea Pigs

Scholars and practitioners of developmentin South America have written with excite-ment about the economic opportunities of-fered by Andean animals. Some scholarssuggest that by using local resources, in-digenous people can transform their ani-mals into assets and wealth (De Soto 2000,Healy 2001). In order to improve indige-nous livelihoods, these authors argue, it isimportant to promote a shift in the ways thatpeople think about and live with animals.For example, Andeans must learn to createclear and clean separations between hu-mans and animals. Ironically, this frame-work emphasizes efficiency and productiv-ity at the expense of ritual, religious, andcultural understandings, even as it promotes"Andean culture." While efficiency and pro-ductivity may indeed be necessary compo-nents of micro-enterprise, these shifts canalso be understood as part of a larger "civi-lizing process" that dovetails with narrativesof assimilation, national integration, andprogress, narratives that have contributed tothe race-based exclusion of some Andeanpeople. Given the extreme poverty of muchof the Andes, there may indeed be indige-nous families who are interested in pursuingsome of these opportunities. Yet, as criticalscholarship in anthropology, geography, anddevelopment studies suggests, developmentdiscourses and practices often have a "top-down" character that leaves little room forconsultation with indigenous people and

Volume 2 • Number 2 • September 2010

demonstrates little ihterest in alternative un-derstandings of ahimals, agriculture, orlivelihoods (Escobar 1994, Garcia 2005,

Lawson 2007).I first learned about NGO efforts to help

indigenous familief in the transition "fromtradition to micro-enterprise" from a manualI encountered in a well-known bookstore inQuito. Across the aisle from a healthy offer-ing of recent volumes on philosophy and lit-erature, and adjacent to the cookbook sec-tion, was a whole range of books designedto help rural people find their way to newmarkets. Picking up one of the manuals, Iimmediately saw that Andean animals werepart of a "new" vision of familiar discoursesof development. In enthusiastic self-helpprose, the manual explained how to go fromcaring for your family-owned guinea pigs tomaking a profit by using them to developyour own small-scale export business. Thelanguage used in this manual inserted mar-ginalized indigenous communities into thepaths of "progress" and "development"spelled out by both states and multilateral in-stitutions such as the World Bank, efforts thathave not escaped neocolonial dynamics.

Some development practitioners describenew "state of the art" breeding techniquesfor indigenous farmers as culturally appro-priate strategies for reducing poverty inhighland communities. Project reports high-light the ways that NGO or government pro-grams "help" indigenous peoples exitpoverty by shifting their traditional ways ofraising animals toward more scientific, busi-ness-oriented, models. They focus on theimportance of training herders to "manage"the reproduction of their animals and im-prove them genetically, so as to insert them-

Marfa Elena Carcfa

selves in the global market and become suc-cessful small business entrepreneurs. How-ever, this approach leaves open the possibil-ity that intermediaries may take over thesesmall-scale production activities to help"scale-up" production and find linkages tourban markets.

To explore the impact of these new ruralenterprises on indigenous farmers and theAndean animals at the heart of these proj-ects, I spoke with agronomist Lilia Chauca,perhaps the leading authority on guinea-pigbreeding and production in Peru. Chaucahas been working at the Institute* Nacionalde Inovacion Agraria (INIA) in the ProyectoCuyes (Guinea Pig Project) since the late1960s.2 Peru has changed a great deal in theperiod between the revolutionary militarydays of General Juan Velasco Alvarado'sgovernment (1968-75) and the current ne-oliberal government of Alan Garcfa. Garcia,a former leftist populist, has now convertedto Chilean-style market-oriented develop-ment. But whatever the developmentmodel, Chauca has patiently and persist-ently insisted on the importance of Andeananimals to the Peruvian economy.

I had many questions for Chauca. Havingseen frozen guinea pigs in conveniencestores in New jersey and Washington State, I

Some ... describe new "state of

the art" breeding techniques for

indigenous farmers as culturallyappropriate strategies for reducing

poverty in highland communities.

Super Guinea PIRS? 27

Frozen guinea pig. Shoreline, Washington (photo byauthor).

wanted to know where these guinea pigscame from and how they factored into newdevelopment strategies. As we spoke in heroffice in Lima, not far from pigs and ducksthat were part of other "productive projects"at the INIA, I was not surprised by Chauca'soptimism. For rural families, raising cuyesmakes economic sense, she explained.Given the growing demand associated withtourism and the small size of the animal,cuy meat is the most expensive meat inPeru. If rural families can be part of this pro-duction process, they stand to gain consid-erably. "It is through and with the cuy," shedeclared, "that we will achieve rural devel-opment." These are big dreams to put on theshoulders of the small guinea pig, butChauca believes that the domestic, nationalconsumption of cuyes is large enough that itmakes sense to encourage rural and evenurban people to consider raising them. Ac-cordingly, INIA offers on-line courses in-tended to help people begin their own smallbusinesses.3

Chauca also had some reservations aboutthe economic potential of cuyes. Exportingcuyes to other countries was not somethingthat she endorsed. This was something of asurprise—Chauca had often been cited in

28 anfhropolojjj VIH

newspaper reports as a supporter of the de-'. velopment of "super guinea pigs" (animals! bred to be up to ten times larger than their

normal size) for export to Andean commu-i nities in the United States, Europe, and! Japan. But in her office, Chauca had a differ-; ent message. First, she explained, the ap-

peal of cuy is culturally bound and does not: have the potential to go far beyond Andean

families. In Peru, she told me, "Andean cos-: movision allows us to eat cuy and under-

stand the animal as one that is eaten, not asa companion animal. But in Holland, nomatter how much you talk with them abouteating cuy, they see the animal as a com-panion animal. Someone can tell me thatdog is delicious and provide me withrecipes, but we are not going to eat doghere" (Chauca 2009).

Chauca also expressed caution about thebureaucratic and legal challenges that comewith the export of cuy. When I asked aboutthe export of these animals, she respondedthat—officially speaking—cuyes were notexported. Cuyes do leave the country, sheexplained, but there is no official categoryfor cuy meat as there is for beef or chicken.Cuyes are exported as "menudencias,"which might best be translated as "offal" or"entrails," even though these animals areexported whole (with only tail and fur re-moved). In addition, the Peruvian govern-ment requires exporters to meet specifichealth and hygiene guidelines, whichmeans that the. cuyes that are exportedcome from commercial farms, not rural fam-ilies. Export profits thus go to large compa-nies and not to small farmers. This might ex-plain Chauca's unexpected conviction that"exporting harms the country" (Chauca

Volume 2 . Number 2 » September 2010

2009). One might even hear a hint of Ve-lasquista nationalism in Chauca's argumentfor national cuy production and againstinternational cuy exportation. WhateverChauca's concerns, guinea pigs are beingexported abroad and in increasingly largenumbers. '

According to recent reports, Peru exportsan estimated 20 tons of frozen guinea pigmeat, around 20,000 cuyes, to the UnitedStates each year. The majority of this trade isconducted by two Peruvian export busi-nesses. Some experts suggest that the grow-ing Andean population in the United Statesmeans that there is potential for even moreexports from Peru. Once again, the questionof representation poses a challenge. TheFood and Drug Administration and theUnited States Department of Agriculture donot have specific categories for guinea pigs;they enter the United States as "exotic" or"other." In some states, California, for in-stance, state laws ban guinea pig meatbecause guinea pigs are considered pets.Ricardo Castillo, general manager of Cas-sandra Productions, Peru's oldest guinea pigexporter, claims, "If guinea pig had its ownrules, shipments would double or triple, be-cause exporters would have more confi-dence" (Mitchell 2006).

Even the most ardent proponents of cuyexports are aware of the cultural limitations

Export profits thus go tolarge companies and not

to small farmers.

Marfa Elena Garcfa

of North American or European markets forguinea pig meat. Nevertheless, given thecontinuing growth of Andean migrant com-munities throughout the world, it is not sur-prising that a growing number of "Latin"markets will increasingly carry traditionalAndean foods like cuy. Moreover, the spec-tacular success of noveau Andean cuisines,which rely in part on traditional animals likecuyes, also suggest that Peruvian restaurantsin New York, San Francisco, or Tokyo mayfollow the example of Acurio's Ch/'charestaurant in Cusco and serve raviolis filledwith cuy. The guinea pig, then, has goneglobal.

Ethical Dilemmas

Although many Peruvians are celebratingthe breeding of "super guinea pigs," de-signed for international and local consump-tion, the words of a scientist responsible forthe creation of these super guinea pigs raiseimportant questions about these animals:

They are faster growing, plumper, and

tastier guinea pigs. They are bred to be

bigger, meatier and ready for slaughter

quicker than they would naturally be.

These few techniques have provided peas-

ants with a simple way to improve their

diet and, in some cases, their income. The

only real losers are the guinea pigs whose

life expectancy is shrinking inexorably

from seven years to only few months. But

who among the guests at the fiesta is going

to complain about such research results?

(quoted in Mitchell 2006)

Supor (iuinoa Pit's? 29

The lessons we have learned aboutthe violence of factory fanning inthe United States are very much

relevant to new experiences withAndean animals.

There are no studies yet that address theimpact of this faster growth and heavier

weight on the guinea pig or the increase in

llama slaughterhouses and industrial alpacafarms, but the large and growing scholarship

on animal welfare in the context of "factoryfarms" in the United States and Europe

might be useful for thinking about supercuyes and the industrialization of other An-dean animals.

While many would reject a claim that the

Global North represents the future of theGlobal South, there is no doubt that many

in the South have the industrial models of

the North in mind. When Chauca lamented

that cuy production is "forty years behindpoultry," I asked her if this really was the

only direction for cuy production. Shereplied that "all [farm] animals have gone in

this direction, and so it must be" (Chauca

2009). Seemingly, then, the battery cages

and the mechanized assembly-line slaugh-

ter of the North American poultry, beef, and

hog industries, like other modular models of

industrialization, are available for emulation

and reproduction across the world. For this

reason, the lessons we have learned aboutthe violence of factory farming in the United

States are very much relevant to new experi-

ences with Andean animals in places like

anthropology M>W

Peru, Bolivia, and Ecuador. Given the glob-

alization of industrial practices and the

growing transnational demand for consum-

ing "traditional" foods, we should also glob-

alize our ethical concerns and worry about

the violence that is an everyday part of in-

dustrial agriculture in both the North andSouth.

Some have argued that concerns about

animal welfare are a luxury of the ad-

vanced, (post)industrial world and are out of

place in the developing world. While there

are important differences between Northand South, to assume that people in the de-

veloping world are indifferent to the welfare

of animals is as problematic as imposing

"first world" ethical debates on "thirdworld" contexts. Consider the example of a

Bolivian woman who refused to sell her

llama to North Americans because selling a

live animal had different spiritual conse-

quences than selling meat: "(The llama] is a

blessing from God, the Pachamama ... it's

one's life. So, you can't sell it alive" (Bolton2006:541).

Concluding Thoughts

In examining how traditional Andean cui-

sine is commodified and marketed, we havean opportunity to ask new questions about

the violence of industrial agriculture. We

might also ask why this form of violence is

so often overlooked, even by scholars con-

cerned with human rights and the structural

violence accompanying various forms of

economic development. In addition to anempirical exploration about what the new

commodification of guinea pigs, alpacas,

Volume 2 * Number 2 * September 2010

Poster advertising guinea pig dishes in Cusco (photo byauthor).

and llamas means for Andean indigenouscommunities, I am interested in finding

ways to ethnographically account for the

impact of these new practices on the ani-

mals themselves. This is uncertain terrain foranr/iro-pologists, who put humans at the

center of their work, and who are accus-

tomed to using prolonged and collaborative

fieldwork to document the voices of those

we meet. Is an ethnography of animal lives

and suffering possible or even desirable?

Thinking back to that beautiful Andean

morning when I visited don Wilbert's cuy

farm, I can see how I foreground his hospi-

tality, the relative humaneness of his pro-

duction methods, and the tail-wagging good

cheer of his two beautiful dogs. In the back-

ground, there is a world I could and perhaps

should have looked at more carefully. I

could have asked about the short and

Maria Elena Garcia

cramped lives of the trout that he had just

begun to cultivate in a small pond on his

land. I could have also asked more inconve-

nient and even impolite questions about the

roosters that he raised for local cockfights

and the practice cock-fighting ring that he

had placed right next to his house. Butthere, in his house, accepting his hospitality,

these questions were hard to ask. The verydifficulty I — we — have in asking hard ques-

tions about the violence that animals expe-

rience, however, is one very strong indica-tion that there are many more questions that

need to be explored.

Notes

1 . See http://www.cablemagico.com.pe/

vercontenido.php?id=61 3.2. INIA and the Proyecto Cuyes have been of-

ficially active since 1968. Over the years, theproject has received less support from the Peru-

vian state and more from international donors,including the Canadian International Develop-

ment Research Center (IDRC).3. For a short video excerpt from an INIA

course, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=:

CxkHe6ulSxw.

References

Acurio, Gaston. 2009. http://www.powerofcul-ture.nl/en/current/2009/march/gaston-acurio.

Acurio, Gaston. 2006. http://www.livinginperu.

com/blogs/features/202 .

Bolton, Maggie. 2006. "Genetic Defects or Gen-

erative Prototypes? Competing Models for Live-

stock Improvement in Southern Bolivia." Journal

Siip<*r fiutnpa Pi£S? 31

of the Royal Anthropological Institute 12:531-548.

Chauca, Lilia. 2009. Interview, Lima, Peru. Au-gust 20.

De Soto, Hernando. 2000. The Mystery of Capi-

tal: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and

Fails Everywhere Else. New York: Basic Books.

Escobar, Arturo. 1994. Encountering Develop-

ment: The Making and Unmaking of the Third

World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Eraser, Laura. 2006. "Next Stop Lima." Gourmet,

August, http://www.gourmet.com/magazine/2000s/2006/08/nextstoplima.

Garcfa, Maria Elena. 2005. Making IndigenousCitizens: Identities, Education, and Multicultural

Development in Peru. Stanford: Stanford Univer-sity Press.

Healy, Kevin. 2001. Llamas, Weaving, and Or-

ganic Chocolate: Multicultural Grassroots De-

velopment in the Andes and Amazon of Bolivia.

South Bend, Indiana: University of Notre DamePress.

Lawson, Victoria. 2007. Making Development

Geography. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Mitchell, Chip. 2006. "Guinea Pig: It's What's forDinner." Christian Science Monitor, Nov. 1.

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Tour of Alejandro Toledo." Journal of Latin Amer-

ican Cultural Studies. Vol. 16, Issue 1:1-10.

Mari'a Elena Garcia is associate professor in the

Comparative History of Ideas program and the

Jackson School of International Studies at the

University of Washington. Her book, Making In-

digenous Citizens: Identities, Development, and

Multicultural Activism in Peru (Stanford 2005)

examines indigenous politics and multicultural

activism in Peru. Her work has appeared in mul-

tiple edited volumes and journals such as Latin

American Perspectives, Anthropological Quar-

terly, Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Stud-

ies, and The International Journal of Bilingual

Education and Bilingualism. Her research and

teaching interests focus on indigeneity, the pro-

duction of alternative knowledge, the articula-

tion of human and non-human struggles, and

Latin American/Latin® cultural politics. Her re-

search in the coming years will be focused on

thinking about the consequences and impact (on

both human and non-human lives) of the com-

mercialization of Andean animals.

My Bun, Her Oven

Elly Teman '-.

32 Hnlhropology NOWVolume 2 • Number 2 . September 201*0

"Their bun, my oven," reads the inscription ;

on mugs and T-shirts that a surrogacy Web :

site sells. "I'm just the incubator developing ;

their cells," says a 33-year-old mother of •

three, who has given birth to the genetic off- :

spring of a couple who contracted her to be

their surrogate. "I'm just the guesthouse," '•

says another surrogate.

People who hear surrogates speak this '.

way about their bodies as vessels, temporar- :

ily hosting other people's children, might as- ;

sume that surrogates are engaged in a harm- •

ful, self-inflicted alienation from their bodies

and selves. Psychologists worry that surro-

gates are motivated by a desire for reparation •

for past actions, such as having an abortion •

or giving up a child for adoption. Feminists •

worry that these women are being dehuman- •

ized and made into victims of a patriarchal ;

system. Ethicists and scholars of religion are

concerned that what these women are doing ',

is unnatural, part of the deconstruction of

motherhood as we know it.When a particular practice—in this case,

surrogate motherhood—troubles so many ;

scholars from other disciplines, anthropolo-

gists provide insights from previously under- :

explored perspectives. Without making ;

value judgments, we try to look at the ways

people involved in the practice give mean-

ings to their actions. We try to understand

the cultural perceptions that their words and

Elly Teman

My bun, her oven (artist: Tsipora tvry).

actions belie. In my anthropological re-

search on surrogacy, I have found that the

metaphors and symbols that surrogate

mothers draw upon to describe their bodies

and their actions during surrogacy reveal

widely accepted cultural perceptions of

motherhood, family, and the human body.

Perhaps even more significant, I see these

same cultural patterns not only as influenc-

ing how surrogates respond to their role but

also as informing how policymakers and the

public at large react to surrogacy.

Mary Douglas andCultural Categories

Let's take a minute to reflect upon one of

the most fundamental ideas we learn as an-

thropology undergraduate students. It is a

lesson best learned, in my opinion, from the

late Mary Douglas, arguably one of the most

well-known and influential anthropologists

of all time. Douglas suggested that people

make sense of their world by making cate-

Mv Him. Her Oven 33