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Title: Law in a Lawless Land: Diary of a Limpieza by Michael Taussig, Michael T. Taussig ISBN: 1-56584-863-2 Publisher: New Press Pub. Date: 01 November, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (1 review)
Rating: 4
Summary: A book about Colombia's forgotten poor
Comment: Michael Taussig is acclaimed in the New York Times as "one of the brightest and most original thinkers in anthropology." I would like to add that Taussig is also a profound student of philosophical anthropology, "the study of the nature and essence of humankind." To this end, "Law in a Lawless Land," is an enormous opening into the minds of Colombia's forgotten poor.
This book is like no other written on Colombia. Taussig does not borrow from the research of legendary historical graybeards like Vernon Lee Fluharty, Richard E. Sharpless, Orlando Fals Borda or German Archiniegas. He does not use academic journals, newspapers or magazines to prove a point. Instead he presents a lyrical diary of his extensive fieldwork. In doing so, the author provides a raw and unnerving documentation of Colombia's long tradition of violence.
Taussig's work is easy reading for students of Colombian - American affairs and Latin American specialists. However, this book will be a tough road for those unfamiliar with Colombia's culture of denial. For instance, Taussig condemns the government. His work is a glaring spotlight on the government's paramilitary utilization of "limpieza" or "social cleansing" of the bottom dwellers of Colombian society (desechables or throwaways). The author does not rely on Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International or even the U.S. State Department's repeated annual reports on the government's feeble human rights record. Taussig lives with the relatives and friends of victims and dumps eyewitness accounts on the reader instead.
The author laments how a handful of wealthy families underhandedly bought and then destroyed an enormously fertile valley for thousands of families...in order to establish the
Cali sugar industry and institutionalize poverty for the same families as cane workers. He also reports how Colombia's Army & Police intelligence officials create "lists" of people that are handed to paramilitary leaders for execution. Union leaders, teachers, priests and other defenders of the poor often make the lists. Taussig does not defend the guerrillas...he knows they are not angels. This book is more about how the poor are caught in a violent sandwich with no hope in sight.
This book discloses a simple fact of life in Colombia. That the ruthless paramilitary death squads are a part of the State strategy...particularly today. The leaders of the paramilitary death squads employ terror and this book is an honest chronicle of regular public assassinations in broad daylight. Yes, it is indeed tragic, that in Colombia the Army will stand aside and allow poor unarmed civilians to get cut to pieces because powerful members of society think this is how you protect democracy. Highly recommended.
Bert Ruiz
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Title: Walking Ghosts: Murder and Guerrilla Politics in Colombia by Steven Dudley ISBN: 041593303X Publisher: Routledge Pub. Date: January, 2004 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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Title: Firing Back: Against the Tyranny of the Market by Pierre Bourdieu, Loic Wacquant ISBN: 1565847385 Publisher: New Press Pub. Date: 12 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: My Cocaine Museum by Michael T. Taussig ISBN: 0226790096 Publisher: University of Chicago Press (Trd) Pub. Date: April, 2004 List Price(USD): $22.50 |
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Title: Killing Peace: Colombia's Conflict and the Failure of U.S. Intervention by Garry M. Leech ISBN: 097203840X Publisher: Information Network of the Americas Pub. Date: April, 2002 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
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Title: More Terrible than Death: Massacres, Drugs, and America's War in Colombia by Robin Kirk ISBN: 1586481045 Publisher: PublicAffairs Pub. Date: 07 January, 2003 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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