War nests in a woman’s body: armed conflict, identities and multiterritorialities

Abstract

This article aims to evidence and describe the processes in which black/Afro-Colombian women victims of forced displacement live and (re)construct their ethnic identities and their multiple spaces of identity reference, within the specific context of the armed conflict in Colombia, considering the concept of identity articulations developed by Stuart Hall and multiterritorialities provided by Rogério Haesbaert. In order to unveil these processes, an ethnographic study was conducted in the cities of Bogotá and Cartagena de Indias. The collection of information was carried out through participant observation and biographies. It is based on the premise that ethnic identities are dynamic, and movable both in their construction within different contexts, and in their activation. These are subject to territorial and translocation processes and are in constant articulation with categories such as race, class, gender, sexuality and religion. This articulation gives an account in turn of the differences in which women build and perceive themselves, but also of the agency and subjectivity with which they organize collectively, demand policies and influence the generation of local and global actions.