CHAPTER 10 THE MAYAN ZAPATISTA MOVEMENT 395Hope: Sharing the Zapatista Journey to Alternative Development(2005), from which we
have drawn particular details in the following section.
Ethnicity and Inclusion
We have already discussed the heterogeneous ethnic composition of the Zapatistas.
Although primarily consisting of native people of the five principal indigenous lin-
guistic groups of Chiapas—Tzeltal, Tzotzil, Tojolabal, Zoque, and Chol—the move-
ment is explicitly notintended to encourage Indian separatism or chauvinism. Spanish
is pragmatically recognized as their own lingua franca and principal language for is-
suing public statements. English is recognized as indispensable for achieving the
high international profile that they seek via the Internet.
In countless public statements, the Zapatistas have said that their vision of a just
society and good government includes everyone who has been previously excluded
from representation and participation in national or community life, be it in Mex-
ico or elsewhere. They insist that a just society should embrace everyone, including
guarantees not only for their inclusion and representationbut also for their right to live
in communities in which their individual cultural identities are respected and celebrated.Na-
tional and international observers are warmly welcomed at their public events, and
their poster art exuberantly highlights international and interethnic solidarity. They
are also adamant about gender equality, as one can easily observe in the scripting of
public events. Of those who have the highest rank of Comandante(a) in the EZLN,
approximately half are women, and they are routinely given equal time in settings of
public debate and discussion (see Figure 10.2).
The ideal of inclusionpervades the symbolism and reality of the Zapatistas (see
Box 10.3). A close reading of their elegantly constructed communiqués reveals that
they consistently place their own goals within the framework of Mexico’s own stated
goals for itself. Zapatistas are simply demanding to be included in the Mexican na-
tional idea that states that the nation embraces all of its people. This has been a cen-
terpiece of Mexican Revolutionary rhetoric for at least sixty years. Perhaps this link
with Mexico’s own story about itself explains the enigma of why a Mayan indigenous
insurrection movement should be so charitably inclined toward the ideology, eth-
nicity, and symbols of its stated adversaries. Indeed, the maximal hero of the Mexi-
can Revolution, Emiliano Zapata, who is the paladin of the Zapatista rebels, was
himself a relatively prosperous mestizo, a son of commercial horse-breeders in cen-
tral Mexico. He spoke Nahuatl as a second language and treated Indians with re-
spect and dignity. He remains one of the few Revolutionary heroes who have not
been discredited by revisionist historians (see the account of Emiliano Zapata the rev-
olutionary in Chapter 8).
Knowledge of Zapata’s own ability to transcend race and ethnicity for higher na-
tional purpose can usefully be applied to an understanding of the enigmatic role of
Subcomandante Marcos, who, like Zapata, was born a child of privilege, renounced
it, and turned to other—he believed—higher causes. He has been, from the begin-
ning in 1994, the high-profile, charismatic chief spokesman for the Zapatistas, and the
author of a vast corpus of Zapatista communiqués and related literary documents.