Studi e ricerche

La velocidad en los mundos lentos

Accidentes, máquinas y sociedades en América del Sur

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open access | peer reviewed

Abstract
From trucks and bulldozers to smaller tools like chainsaws and electric generators, a massive influx of machinery is currently reshaping Latin America’s peripheral landscapes. This process of mechanical colonization introduces disruptive and often violent forms of acceleration that profoundly impact environments and societies. Drawing on anthropology, history, and geography, this volume analyzes mechanical accidents as critical events. These events are not random fatalities but reveal tensions between machines, territories, and societies, prompting a re-evaluation of concepts like materiality, agency and causality.

Keywords Accidents • Explosion mining capitalism • Suicide • Prevention • Motorcycles • Road anthropology • Roads • Amazonia • Infrastructure • Progress • Sulfur mining • Road accidentality • Memory • Animal trampling • Spaces of memory • Guarani ethnography • Copper mining • Accident • History of the Chaco • Volcanoes • Technological appropriation • Jujuy • Wichí • Mining • State • In-between • Neo-wildlife • Chile • Indigenous labor • Rhythm • Machine-animal relations • National identity • Rubber Boom • Power • Mapuche • History • Storytelling • Trains • Addictions • Symbols • Tragedy • Bolivia • Speed • Train accident • Travel Accounts • Humahuaca, Iturbe • Indigenous perception • Press • Technology • Chaco • Gran Chaco • Mixtecs • Development projects • Lafkenche society • Government agencies • Chuquicamata • Shipwrecks • Being-on-the-street • Oral tradition • Potosí • Hunter and gatherers • Indigenous peoples • Asphalt • Aullagas • Extractive industries • Transportation • Whalers • Easter Island • Machines • Motorcycle • Routes • Culture • Anthropology of infrastructure • Capitalism • Violence • Imaginary • Draining machines • Mechanization • Extractivism • Ayoreo

Thema codes JHMC • NHTK • 1KLS • 3MN

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-940-5 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-940-5 | Published Sept. 30, 2025 | Language es