‘We are a Marginal Community:’ The Discourse of Marginality in the Theatre of War

This article discusses how, in the aftermath of the Peruvian internal war, people in the community of Chapi refer to themselves as ‘marginal’ when they explain their relations to the Peruvian state. Through an analysis of the category ‘marginal,’ a term originally coined by scholars but commonly applied to rural Quechua people, I explore how these people partially accept subordination, but also express hope that the state will take care of them. Beyond its uses and intentions, labeling rural Quechuas as ‘marginal’ reinscribes and reproduces subordination and the animosity manifested toward them by dominant Peruvian society.