ABSTRACT
When I returned to do fieldwork in Chiapas in 1987, nearly 20 years after I had terminated my previous study, I was impressed with both the continuities and the changes. The town center in Amatenango seemed to have preserved the semblance of its corporate character while pushing the problems to the hamlets in the periphery. The old thatched-roof town hall had been replaced by a modest adobe building during the 1980s, which was in turn supplanted by a two-story building modeled on those being constructed in PRI-dominated towns throughout the highlands in the 1990s. A tiled plaza, ringed by shrubbery and shade trees, gave the impression of a ladino town as one entered on a paved street from the Pan American highway. The kiosk that had been the pride of the ladino schoolteacher in the 1960s was painted with graffiti, with CIOAC, PRD, and OCEZ slogans predominating, while the public buildings built by the PRI government were emblazoned with the red, green, and white logo of the party.
