Pedro Cayuqueo. 2017. <em>Historia secreta mapuche</em>
10.13125/americacritica/3297
Recensione di Pedro Cayuqueo, Historia secreta mapuche. Santiago de Chile: Catalonia, 2017, pp. 372.
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2532-6724
3297
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urn:nbn:it:unica-22725
Ayelen Rosario Tissera
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
América Crítica
Pedro Cayuqueo. 2017. <em>Historia secreta mapuche</em>
Text.Serial.Journal
https://ojs.unica.it/index.php/cisap
2
Recensioni
2018-07-23
2018-04-02
2018-07-23
2018-07-23
87-89
1
Ayelen Rosario Tissera
2018/07/23
10.13125/americacritica/3297
87
State University of New York at Binghamton, United States
2532-6724
1
en
89
urn:nbn:it:unica-22725
Pedro Cayuqueo. 2017. <em>Historia secreta mapuche</em>
https://ojs.unica.it/index.php/cisap/article/download/3297/pdf
2
                                                 2018 América Crítica. Vol. 1, n° 1, giugno 2018




                                                                                     REVIEW
                                                                            PEDRO CAYUQUEO
                                                                HISTORIA SECRETA MAPUCHE
                                                    Santiago de Chile: Catalonia, 2017. 372 pp.




   Historia Secreta Mapuche thrives in of-        catches the reader’s attention.
fering its audiences a compelling, uncon-            The first point which turns this histor-
ventional retelling of the story of the Ma-       ical chronicle of the Mapuche into an ap-
puche, one of the many native communi-            pealing account and sets it apart from
ties of Latin America. At the end of the          others of similar nature lies in the fact
prologue to the book, Pedro Cayuqueo              that it is written not by a historian, an an-
tells his readers that if he succeeds in          thropologist, an ethnographer or an
catching our curiosity, surprising us, and        archeologist, but by a journalist. Besides
making us feel uncomfortable, we will             his profession, the Chilean Pedro
then be closer to that “vieja utopía liber-       Cayuqueo is a Mapuche descendant very
taria mapuche. Aquella de construir un            well known for his role as an activist for
mundo donde quepan muchos mundos”                 the Mapuche cause. Following this path,
‘old libertarian mapuche utopia. The one          Cayuqueo has participated in different
of building a world where many other              newspapers and magazines in Chile, Ar-
worlds fit’ (my trans.; 158). A book              gentina, Spain and England. He is the
whose main objective is to unsettle audi-         author of books including Just for Being
ences by striping widely accepted histor-         Indians and The Voice of the Ionkos. Cur-
ical “truths” so as to reimagine a more           rently, he is the Director of the Mapuche
interconnected, healed future, definitely         Times and hosts the TV programme

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons © Ayelen Rosario Tissera
Review - Cayuqueo “Historia secreta Mapuche”
2018 ⎸América Crítica. Vol. 2, n° 1, giugno 2018: 87-89
DOI: 10.13125/américacrítica/3297
88                                                                      AYELEN ROSARIO TISSERA

Kulmapu aired on CNN Chile.                      Under a decolonizing point of view,
   It is interesting to highlight the cur-    Cayuqueo presents to these audiences a
rent historical moment in which this          historical account of the Mapuche com-
book is being presented. The two coun-        munity freshly separated from the “offi-
tries placed at the southern end of the       cial history” maintained on both sides of
Latin American cone are undergoing a          the Andes since the nineteenth century.
socio-political process in which fanatical    The author succeeds in telling a story
positions prime over the more conciliato-     which, despite the fact of being plagued
ry, mutually understanding ones. In oth-      with injustices, should no longer be con-
er words, there is an attitude towards        nected to grief, resentment and hatred.
dismissing indigenous threads, particu-       On the contrary, Cayuqueo urges the
larly Mapuche ones, as part of the Ar-        readers to stop seeing the Mapuche as
gentinian and Chilean national identity.      victims, recognize their agency, and start
Under this context, a book such as Histo-     thinking about them as a community
ria Secreta which does not consider the       which has its heroes, its deeds, and mis-
Mapuche people as strictly Chilean nor        fortunes as any other community in the
Argentinian is in itself an outstanding re-   world. Apart from this, the author shows
sisting position against the extreme na-      how the Mapuche are today still very
tionalist, separatist wave which soaks        much alive and very active in the strug-
these neighbor countries and perpetuates      gles each country poses against them.
Eurocentric divisions.                        This image of native peoples currently
   The simple yet engaging writing that       engaging with their realities is clearly
Cayuqueo uses in this book makes it ac-       challenging the western tale of indige-
cessible in such a way that the intended      nous peoples as having existed only in
audience is not circumscribed just to         an ancient past.
those immersed in the debates of the top-        The book opens with a description of
ics at hand. Therefore, with this book, the   Wallmapu, the Mapuche country that de-
author is aiming not just to an audience      fies the current geographical division of
formed by the people in the fields of in-     Argentina and Chile. With a relaxed,
digenous, ethnic, and cultural studies        ironic but still denunciatory tone, the
but he pretends to appeal to all those        book revises and questions established
book lovers and history aficionados liv-      historical myths such as “La Conquista
ing in Chilean and Argentinian soil, in       del Desierto” ‘The Conquest of the
the rest of the Latin American brother        Desert’, “Civilización y Barbarie” ‘Civi-
countries, and around the globe.              lization and Barbarism’, and “Los Arau-



                      2018 América Crítica. Vol. 1, n° 1, giugno 2018
REVIEW - CAYUQUEO “HISTORIA SECRETA MAPUCHE”                                               89

canos”. Conversing with Chilean and Ar-       treatment of the history of the Mapuche
gentinian scholarship, the narrative of       peoples by overthrowing the very idea of
the book resignifies the role of notable      “objectiveness” often found in accounts
historical figures such as Lautaro (who       of native communities informed by prej-
inspired the formation of the Lautaro         udiced anthropological mechanisms. He
Lodge), Calfulcurá the Napoleon of the        himself declares that he is not a historian
Pampas, the Argentinian hero José de          but just a “faithful history reader”, there-
San Martín and his Chilean equivalent         fore, his account differs from what a
Bernardo O’Higgins, and the genocidal         reader would expect in a history book.
Julio Argentino Roca who is still seen as     Consequently, Cayuqueo engages at a
a national hero in the Argentinian histo-     personal level with this history, because
ry. Pedro Cayuqueo closes the book with       it is the history of his people, it is the his-
an insight that sees the twentieth century    tory of our people. The book interrogates
as a period of “reorganización, la lucha      and challenges the “official histories”
política y el de la memoria contra la         taught for so long in Argentinian and
asimilación y el olvido” ‘reorganization,     Chilean educational systems because of
political struggle and memory against         its powerful impact on the configuration
the assimilation and oblivion’ all neces-     of national identities from the founda-
sary processes if Chile and Argentina         tions of young minds. In connection to
wish to enter the twenty-first century        this it is also that Cayuqueo manages to
with an attitude towards healing, sur-        use the essence of the language from our
vivance (to borrow Gerald Vizenor’s           contemporary, hyperconnected, media-
term), engagement to our own history,         tized world to channel his message di-
and bonding to brother native communi-        rectly to the younger generations since
ties at a planetary level.                    they are the ones who will rethink the
   As a journalist, Cayuqueo expands the      stories of our continent.

                                                                        Ayelen Rosario Tissera


                                                 State University of New York, Binghamton


                                                                    ayutissera@hotmail.com




                      2018 América Crítica. Vol. 2, n° 1, Luglio 2018
