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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

Guatemalan highlands, lynching, customary law, Mayan town

College

Humanities

Department

Comparative Arts and Letters

Abstract

The primary objective of my project was to explore the relationship between customary law and lynching in a Mayan town in the Guatemalan highlands. Customary or traditional punishments occur with much greater frequency than lynchings, but the latter occurs often enough that it has come to be seen as somewhat of a phenomenon in post-conflict Guatemala. In exploring the relationship between the two, the central question I sought to answer was how two similar crimes that occurred in the same community could be punished by customary law on the one hand and lynching on the other. In order to best answer that question, I will first established a basis for the problem of collective violence in Guatemala by summarizing the conclusions and theories that others have reached regarding its causes and effects. After reviewing the literature on the topic, I will focus in on my field site of Nahuala to see which of the theories on the topic seem most relevant in describing the lynching that occurred there.

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