From Olmecs to Zapatistas: A Once and Future History of Souls

Mesoamerican beliefs and practices centered around the concept of an animal soul or co-essence have roots that can be traced back to the epi-Olmec art of pre-Classic times, and they remain a vital force today. These beliefs and practices require individuals and communities to define intimate aspects of their identities in terms of distant others. The Zapatista movement is simultaneously a peasant rebellion centering on agrarian issues and a pan-Mayan cultural uprising focusing on ethnic identity, and in this latter aspect it bears the marks of the Mesoamerican construction of self and other.