Activist Efforts of the Mapuche People and Mapuche Advocacy Organizations to Preserve their Land Rights

Abstract

The Mapuche people are the only indigenous group in Spanish America not to have capitulated to Spanish colonization. Then the nationalist Chilean government expropriated 94% of their original land holdings. The Mapuche, whose name means "people of the land" in their native language, consider their land to be sacred. Now, they and other organizations in Chile which promote their cause are renewing their efforts to regain their land through activism, specifically land occupation and protests. I am planning to study these efforts through oral and archival research.