Abstract

MIRANDA ZAMBRANO, Gloria Amparo  and  ALEJO LOPEZ, Sergio Jacinto. Contributions of traditional knowledge and identity to sustainability: The Wise Educators of eco-tourism, “Parque Ejidal, Totolapan”, México. El periplo sustentable [online]. 2017, n.33, pp.690-722. ISSN 1870-9036.

This work examines the representation, relevance, and contribution of traditional knowledge in the work of tour guides of a social, eco-tourism “ejido” (common-land reserve) in Mexico City. The tour guides offer educational services, which are based on the natural resources of the reserve (woodland). The objective was to scrutinize how, through a service, sui generis and unprecedented for the guides, it is possible to show the modernization and value of traditional knowledge, as a result of a process of interrelations that explain invisibility-affirmation-viability, and is constituted as a relevant contribution of rural populations to environmental sustainability. The research was qualitative, where the focus was on the social actor for analysis of cultural and symbolic discourses. Participant observation, participative research, life stories, and ethnography was an essential part of the analysis of the complexity of the phenomenon. It eminently shows how, in a blurry environment loaded with irony towards the work, because it involves aspects of anonymity and invisibility, the ejido project can give new meaning to the local body of knowledge. Another finding evidenced the existence of a formative-educative collaboration and transcendence towards visitors, in which the commitment and sentiment of identity are transmitted towards the environment and sustainability; very different to the closed logic of conventional tourism.

Keywords : Traditional knowledge; identity/subjectivity; indigenous people; ecotourism.