Session Description: Our video explores the cultural production of 'Latin America' in Durham, North Carolina. Our focus is on the feelings and significance of movement itself, including migration, dance, and long-distance relay runs especially as these movements entail celebrations of, or promises to, the Virgin of Guadalupe. For eleven consecutive years, dancers of all ages
have honored the Virgin of Guadalupe with hours of indigenous 'matachine' dancing. Afterward, many of the same dancers and their families go to a special Catholic mass for the Virgin. In a closely related activity linked to the immigrants' rights movement, Antorcha Guadalupana runners carried a torch through Durham en route from the Basilica of Guadalupe in central Mexico to Saint Patrick's Cathedral in New York City in 2005 and 2007. Relay runners in this event literally trace out new NAFTA geographies that link migrant families and communities in Mexico and the United States. These celebratory and spiritual movements contribute to decolonial understandings of 'Latin America'.
