Main concept
Cultural Persistence and Continuity
By cultural persistence and continuity, we refer to:
- Historical dynamics relating to the stability, preservation and maintenance of cultural practices.
- The collective capacity of CHamoru communities to maintain their cultural identity across centuries of colonialism.
The emphasis on cultural persistence is grounded in Indigenous, postcolonial and feminist studies that underscore the importance of establishing cultural continuity to understand the past and how it has shaped the present. Cultural continuity is a type of cultural dynamics that characterize maintenance activities.
Cultural continuity has, however, traditionally been disregarded by mainstream patriarchal analyses of cultural processes. The idealization of change—coupled with the Enlightenment notion of progress and the more recent concept of innovation—has resulted in an almost exclusive focus of dynamics of cultural change in narrations of the past[1].
Cultural persistence and continuity have been embraced in various contexts and are related to concepts such as cultural resistance, community re-existence and cultural survival. In our particular case, we feel in connection with Indigenous rights activists in Tåno’ Låguas yan Gåni who have challengednarratives of CHamoru cultural demise and led efforts to defend cultural resistance and revitalization. In Tåno’ Låguas yan Gåni cultural continuity is enacted and reinforced through Kostumbren CHamoru, a rubric to refer to traditional relational values and practices, express CHamoru identity, and defend cultural persistence.
MaGMa focuses on cultural continuity and persistence as forms of successful resistance, while also highlighting the traumatic consequences, past and present, of modern colonialism. Cultural persistence existed but it cannot be used to soften or whitewash the violent nature of colonialism.
[1] Montón-Subías S, Hernando A. (2018) Modern Colonialism, Eurocentrism and Historical Archaeology: Some Engendered Thoughts. European Journal of Archaeology; 21(3):455-471
Aberigua more
The following is merely a selection, and we apologize for any omissions. If you, dear reader, notice any missing references, please let us know so that we may include them.
- https:// www. guampedia. com/ voices- of- our- elders/
- https://www.guampedia.com/envisioning-the-past-near-extinction/
- Á. Granell, Carmen. 2024. Escudriñando las materialidades de Tåno’ Låguas yan Gåni entre el 1500 AEC y el 1898 EC: el aprendizaje transgeneracional como dinámica histórica de re-existencia comunitaria. Doctoral Thesis. Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
- Bayman, J., Dixon, B., Montón-Subías, S., and Moragas, N. (2020). Colonial surveillance, Låncho, and the perpetuation of intangible cultural heritage in Guam, Mariana Islands. In Beaule, C. and Douglass, J. (eds.), The Global Spanish Empire: Five Hundred Years of Place Making and Pluralism. University of Arizona Press, Tucson, pp. 222-241.
- Bevacqua, M. L. & Kelley Bowman, I. (2016). Histories of Wonder, Futures of Wonder: Chamorro Activist Identity, Community, y Leadership in “The Legend of Gadao” and “The Women Who Saved Guåhan from a Giant Fish”. Marvels & Tales 30(1): 70-89.Clement, M. (2019). Garrison folks and reducciones: bifurcating the Hagåtña narrative in 18th century Marianas history. 4th Marianas History Conference, Guampedia, Manguilao, pp. 27–58.
- Diaz, V. M. (1994). Simply CHamoru: telling tales of demise and survival in Guam. Contemporary Pacific 6(1): 29-58.
- Flores, J. (1999). Art and Identity in the Mariana Islands: Issues of Reconstructing an Ancient Past. Doctoral Thesis. University of East Anglia.
- Hattori, A. P. (2018). Textbook tells: gender, race, and decolonizing Guam history textbooks in the 21st century. AlterNative 14(2): 173-184.
- Marsh, Kelly G. (2013). An Exploration of Indigenous Values and Historic Preservation in Western Micronesia: A Study in Cultural Persistence.Doctoral Thesis. Charles Sturt University.
- Montón-Subías, S. & Hernando A. (2022). Modern colonialism and cultural continuity through material culture: an example from Guam and CHamoru plaiting. International Journal of Historical Archaeology 26(3): 823-47.
- Souder, L. (1992). Daughters of the Island: Contemporary CHamoru Women Organizers on Guam. University Press of America, Lanham, MD.
- Souder, L. (2021). Curses and blessings: Navigating MY Indigenous identity between colonial empires.I estoria-ta. The Mariana Islands and Chamorro Culture, 167-173.
- Taitano DeLeslie, C. (2015). A history of CHamoru nurse-midwives in Guam and a “Placental Politics” for Indigenous feminism. Intersections: Gender and Sexuality in Asia and the Pacific, 37.
- Underwood, R. (2021) I ManCHamoru Pa’go – The CHamoru people today. I estoria-ta. The Mariana Islands and Chamorro Culture, 9-14.
