La multilocalidad y los desafíos identitarios de jóvenes indígenas en Bolivia [Multilocality and related identity challenges of Indigenous youth in Bolivia]

Much attention has been paid to urban indigeneity, a phenomenon that existed during pre-colonial times, prevailed during colonial occupation, and characterises the current juncture in which a majority of indigenous peoples in Latin America live in cities. Most research on urban indigeneity reproduces delimited, fixed, and linear territorial perspectives, focusing on the city as the central unit of analysis, or considering rural-urban mobility as unidirectional. The aim of this article is to offer an alternative approach that pays attention to rural-urban territorial interconnections, which we conceptualise through a multilocality (understood here as concomitant, stationary, and/ or alternative residence in rural and urban spaces, "movements between" and “belonging to” different territories) and youth perspective (considering intergenerational changes in indigenous and Bolivian society). Based on comparative participatory action research in Bolivia, we explore the multilocal lives of four groups of indigenous youth based in the departments of Beni, Chuquisaca, La Paz and Santa Cruz. The article addresses the following questions: Why do indigenous youth lead a multilocal life? How is this articulated in everyday life? In addition to tracing the politico-economic forces that drive multilocality, we also emphasize how multilocal indigenous youths "challenge" cultural and political perspectives and practices in their home territories while struggling to preserve their identity in the multiple settings they inhabit. Based on this analysis, we propose a conceptualisation of indigenous territoriality without borders.