202557(en)/20 - Walking with the Dead: Walks and Paths in Villa Francia (Santiago, Chile)

Cristóbal Palma Rojas

Drawing on an ethnographic experience in Villa Francia, a popular and politically organized neighborhood in Santiago de Chile, I address the relationship between young residents killed during the military dictatorship and the current inhabitants of the sector. I argue that the bond between the living and the dead is a forged by walkers and through walks. This connection has taken shape not only through commemorative walks, but also through what I refer to as caminares (the walks): the biographical, necrographical, and historical lines and routes traced by both the living and the dead. The aim is to construct a conceptualization of death and life after death that moves beyond a purely symbolic and/or representational point of view.

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