Los paisajes del agua: Naturaleza e identidad en la cuenca del río valdivia

Abstract

Collective identities adapt to the design that populations impose on their landscape. The study of the communities of the northern basin of the Valdivia river and their adaptation to the lines and bodies of water allows one to explore the underlying structures of their collective identities, structures that reveal the imprint of the landscape upon social practice. In the history of these communities, including such critical moments as the constitution of property (1904-1960), the Timber Industrial Complex of Panguipulli (1970-1973) and hydroelectric projects (from 2009 onwards), references to water are inescapable. The analysis of this history, two idealized models of organizing landscape are revealed, each conditioning in different ways the construction of identity in both Chilean and Mapuche communities. One is dendritic, characteristic of the Mapuche adaptation to the movement of water; the other is reticular, expressing the control over water by a foreign rationality. Both models frame perception and self-perception among local populations, influencing current collective identities evidenced in the social practices of the basin's residents.