Hacienda ruins as sites of difficult memory in Chimborazo, Ecuador

Abstract

For over 200 years, until the 1960s, a system of haciendas and debt peonage dominated the rural economy of the central Ecuadorian highland province of Chimborazo. Over the last 40 years, with land reform and growing indigenous political and economic power, the hacienda system has declined. The ruins of hacienda architectural complexes now dot the landscape of highland Ecuador, presenting challenges to ideas of heritage representation, management, and visions of the rural past. Through the presentation of three case studies of hacienda complexes outside the town of Colta, Ecuador, I propose that these properties usefully remain in legal limbo, providing community architectural spaces and spaces for the memories of great pain that surround the hacienda era in this region.