Gentry(fication) & Tourism in Oaxaca

After working for 6 years in Oaxaca teaching cooking classes and gastronomic tours, I was able to observe certain patterns of behavior of many of the actors that make up the social fabric. Gentrification and tourism in Oaxaca have greatly influenced the way of life of the people who have lived there for centuries and those of us who arrived later. From the purely native population, to the first colonizers and missionaries, to the people who have migrated from outside the state and those who have migrated internally within the state; all of us people and state entities interact in different ways and have shaped life in Oaxaca.

Each of us from our own trenches and from our different perspectives have played, to a greater or lesser degree, a role in this melting pot of experiences and histories. During these interactions with tourists, migrants, locals, poor, rich, foreigners, nationals and from different backgrounds and contexts, I listened to them and asked them how this process has affected or benefited them. Much of the content of this text are reflections and conclusions about those conversations and about trying to observe everything from a critical approach of class and race. I also decided to enrich it and back it with more sources, either books, websites, or even Tiktoks and videos from the Internet.

In this zine of independent edition and price defined by the reader, as well as copyright free distribution, I try to share my experience and perspective after having interacted in that system from the inside, living the contradictions that it implies. It is difficult to delve into such an extensive topic, so this approach to gentrification in Oaxaca is more a general reflection of the aspects I found most relevant, as well as an approach to the subject a little more friendly and less technical. I hope with this I can contribute to the discussion of the problem that currently exists in virtual spaces but also, another objective is to be able to distribute this content offline in less academic spaces, just where gentrification has had more impact, at street level.