Sepur Zarco, Guatemala: ‘bodying forth’ and forensic aesthetics of witnessing in the courtroom and beyond

Posocco, Silvia (2022) Sepur Zarco, Guatemala: ‘bodying forth’ and forensic aesthetics of witnessing in the courtroom and beyond. Feminist Anthropology 3 (1), pp. 12-27. ISSN 2643-7961.

Abstract

Drawing on long-term anthropological research in Guatemala, the article examines the case of sexual and labor slavery in armed conflict known as ‘Sepur Zarco’. Focusing on the scene of selected court hearings related to events that took place in a military base near the village of Sepur Zarco, Izabal, between 1982 and 1986, the analysis focuses on ‘bodying forth’ (Das 2007), as a process of witnessing, materialisation and subjectification that emerges in the declarations of the different parties, as they conjure up Dominga Cuc Coc, a local Maya Q’eqchi’ woman, on the riverbank washing army uniforms under duress, or as the body of the forensic exhumation. ‘Bodying forth’ is tied to performative forensic imaginaries and aesthetics in the courtroom, the broader Guatemalan body politic, and beyond; it challenges the epistemologies underpinning law and science to re-centre the necessary differential and differentiated accounts of the witnesses and their appeals to justice.

Metadata

Statistics

DownloadsShow export options

Export as XMLJSONCSV

Activity Overview

6 month trend

121Downloads

6 month trend

158Hits

Additional statistics are available via IRStats2.

Archive Staff Only (login required)

Edit/View Item