Frontier Road: Power, History, and the Everyday State in the Colombian Amazon (Antipode Book Series)

The Antipode Book Series explores radical geography 'antipodally,' in opposition, from various margins, limits or borderlands.Antipode books provide insight 'from elsewhere,' across boundaries rarely transgressed, with internationalist ambition and located insight; they diagnose grounded critique emerging from particular contradictory social relations in order to sharpen the stakes and broaden public awareness. An Antipode book might revise scholarly debates by pushing at disciplinary boundaries, or by showing what happens to a problem as it moves or changes. It might investigate entanglements of power and struggle in particular sites, but with lessons that travel with surprising echoes elsewhere.Antipode books will be theoretically bold and empirically rich, written in lively, accessible prose that does not sacrifice clarity at the altar of sophistication. We seek books from within and beyond the discipline of geography that deploy geographical critique in order to understand and transform our fractured world. Frontier Road uses the history of one road in southern Colombia—known locally as "the trampoline of death"—to demonstrate how state-building processes and practices have depended on the production and maintenance of frontiers as inclusive-exclusive zones, often through violent means. Considers the topic from multiple perspectives, including ethnography of the state, the dynamics of frontiers, and the nature of postcolonial power, space, and violence Draws attention to the political, environmental, and racial dynamics involved in the history and development of transport infrastructure in the Amazon region Examines the violence that has sustained the state through time and space, as well as the ways in which ordinary people have made sense of and contested that violence in everyday life Incorporates a broad range of engaging sources, such as missionary and government archives, travel writing, and oral histories Content: Series Editors Preface viii Acknowledgements ix Introduction 1 Part I 19 1 Reyes dream 21 2 A Titans work 62 3 Fray Fidel de Montclar s deed 92 Part II 141 4 The trampoline of death 143 5 On the illegibility effects of state practices 182 6 The politics of the displaced 211 Conclusion: The condition of frontier 240 References 248 Index 264 "Frontier Road uses the history of one road in southern Colombia--known locally as "the trampoline of death"--to demonstrate how state-building processes and practices have depended on the production and maintenance of frontiers as inclusive-exclusive zones, often through violent means."--Provided by publisher Frontier Road uses the history of one road in southern Colombia known locally as the trampoline of death to demonstrate how state-building processes and practices have depended on the production and maintenance of frontiers as inclusive-exclusive zones, often through violent means.