Janet Ceja: Preserving and Archiving a Religious Fiesta

On Tuesday, February 16, Professor Janet Ceja spoke to SCoSAA members and SLIS students about her ongoing research during a talk entitled: Preserving and Archiving a Religious Fiesta. Professor Ceja presented this research with the understanding that it is still very much a work in progress, and she welcomed discussion and audience participation throughout the conversation.

At present, Professor Ceja is working to create a participatory or community archive for La Fiesta Guadalupana de la Plaza de Limon, creating an archival collection surrounding the community of Limon, a small, rural town in Mexico, and its religious festivities. Ceja explained that archives are not accessible for this community, and the rituals reveal valuable information about the communities history and context, both independently and in relation to global markets and its diaspora. The town is also part of Cejas own family history, as this is where her parents are from, and so she has a personal interest in helping to create a community and participatory archive on the internet. She showed a video which she created, describing the history of La Plaza de Limon and La Fiesta Guadalupana, so that the group would have a better understanding:https://youtu.be/OeB8YB064hU

The audience enjoyed a discussion about the definition of a community archive with Professor Ceja, explaining the way these efforts are a bottom-up, rather than top-down, perspective on archival collecting. Ceja went on to say that community archives provide access to community heritage and give the community members the power in defining themselves. Working in this way, there is a dichotomy between the amateur and professional archivists, whose roles are indubitably going to be intertwined. In this context, there is a kind of duality–the archivist does not have the role of the expert, but instead shares responsibility with the community members.

Professor Ceja went on to show an archived image of a website the community had, upon which the community members and the diaspora communicated about events, marriages, sports, and even shared contact information: https://web.archive.org/web/20140802000137/http://www.laplazadellimon.net/.

This site went down in 2013, and Professor Ceja has yet to get in touch with the creator/manager. Since that time, most online community interactions, including those with the diaspora, have occurred on Facebook. La Plaza de Limon has its own Facebook page where people have uploaded content, mainly in the form of videos and photos. There are also numerous different videos which relate to the communitys fiestas on Youtube, which Professor Ceja also shared; these depict different types of celebrations as well as different groups within society. Much of the newer online content, in large part because it is spread across social media, presents a unique challenge for gathering. However, even if it is spread, the videos show the performative narrative of these festivals, their religious, nationalistic, and even commercial aspects.

Professor Ceja opened the conversation up for discussion following a particularly relatable quotation by Arjun Appadurai, which included the phrase, The work of the imagination is not the privilege of the elites, intellectuals, and soi-distant Marxists, suggesting the need to create a space for social memory beyond just the government and elite members of society. Creating a historical record of Limon and its culture and festivals, in a place where there is little access to archives, is a challenging but valuable effort. Questions during the discussion related to the practical ways Professor Ceja has begun this project, much of which is still in its earliest stages. She spoke briefly about the challenges of gathering content and also garnering interest, as most people dont necessarily understand why their experiences and festivals are deserving of such attention.