CULTURE, CONFLICT AND WATER USES IN THE ÑÄÑHO COMMUNITY OF SANTIAGO MEXQUITILÁN

Abstract

The text analyzes the conflict raised around water in the ñäñho community of Santiago Mexquititlán, which was presented from the taking of a water well and continued with the protection before the enactment of the Law regarding water in the state of Querétaro of the year 2022. The work exposes the methodological approach of Participatory Action Research and ethnography for the description and contextualized analysis of the conflict of uses, management, social organization and cultural elements around water. The objective was to recover these aspects for the elaboration of an anthropological expertice. The theoretical reading was based on cultural materialism and political anthropology to highlight the conflict between the State and socio-cultural formations... Finally, it is concluded that the care and management of water in the community, is based and strengthened in the organizational tradition, in the ritual cycles, in the myths and beliefs of their culture. Therefore, the cultural reproduction of the people is intrinsically related to the water resource, to the extent that it depends for its care and good management in the place, of the practices, knowledge and beliefs of the Ñäñho culture.