Mining presence

Extraction and embodiment in Valles Centrales, Oaxaca

Bibliographic Data

ID3139620
AuthorsElena G Tjandra (0000-0002-1709-9313, The University of Melbourne, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume25
Issue4
Pages639-657
Publication date2024-04-20
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial & Cultural Geography (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1464-9365 • E-ISSN: 1470-1197
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14649365.2023.2189290
OpenAlexW4362465768
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited64

This paper offers a critical reflection on the ways extractive industries manifest within and across place. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in Mexico over 8 months in 2019–2020, this paper focuses on the experiences of residents living in a town adjacent to an underground silver mine in Valles Centrales, Oaxaca, Mexico. I argue that a focus on lived, sensory and long-term engagement between people and mining opens new avenues for geographers to consider 'what mining does'. Looking beyond the language of 'impacts', I build upon work on cultural geographies of presence and absence to put forward the notion of 'mining presence': mining's present and absent affects and materialities that interweave with residents' everyday lives, homes, bodies, and landscapes. In other words, I explore the qualities of mining that bring the San José mine into a neighbouring town and mediate spaces of daily life. In doing so, this paper contributes to the geographies of the extractive industries by showing that attention to life with mining requires a re-thinking of the spatiotemporal relations of extraction itself. Presencia Minera: extracción y materialización en Valles Centrales, Oaxaca

Aesthetics · Art · Ethnography · Everyday life · Geography · Mining engineering · Mining industry · Political science · Sand mining · Sociology · Work (physics · Anthropology · Engineering · Environmental Justice and Health Disparities · Law · Mining and Resource Management · Water Governance and Infrastructure