The The mestiza in Anzaldúa and Ch’ixi in Cusicanqui

Theoretical propositions surpassing the “in-between”

Abstract

This article proposes a convergence between the concepts of mestiza in Gloria Anzaldúa, Chicana writer, poet, and feminist, and Ch’ixi in Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, Bolivian intellectual, sochologist, and activist. Both offer critical perspectives on mestizaje and its effects on social, cultural, and political practices in the Latin American context. While Anzaldúa (1987) elaborates a mestiza based on the Mexico-US border experience, marked by multilingualism and resistance to colonial and imperialists impositions, Cusicanqui (2010) mobilizes the Aymara perspective of Ch'ixi to question the modern homogenization and affirm the coexistence of tensions between differences. The article shows that these proposals do not function as analytical tools, but as embodied epistemologies that transform the researcher and the object. In this way, they destabilize the binary logic of “between” and open paths for thinking about epistemological plurality and the decolonization of knowledge in Latin America.