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E-book
Author Fontes, Anthony W., author

Title Mortal doubt : transnational gangs and social order in Guatemala City / Anthony W. Fontes
Published Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2018]
©2018

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Description 1 online resource (x, 322 pages)
Series Atelier : ethnographic inquiry in the twenty-first century ; 1
Atelier (Oakland, Calif.) ; 1.
Contents Bring out the dead -- Portrait of a "real" marero -- Brother's bones -- Emissaries of the violent peace -- The road to prison -- Porous prisons -- The prisoners and the cascabel -- Extorted life -- Make it a global -- Made for media murder -- Farewell Guatemala City -- Liminal redemption -- Epilogue
Summary "The fact and fear of crime dominate Guatemala City. In the midst of unprecedented levels of postwar violence, Guatemalans struggle to comprehend the myriad forces that have made life in this city so deeply insecure. Born out of histories of state terror, migration, and deportation, maras (or transnational gangs) have become the veritable face of this new era of violence. They are brutal organizations engaged in extortion, contract killings, and the drug trade, and yet they have also become essential to the making of a certain kind of social order. Based on years of fieldwork inside prisons, police precincts, and gang-dominated neighborhoods, Anthony W. Fontes demonstrates how gang violence has become indissoluble from contemporary social imaginaries, and how these gangs provide cover for a host of other criminal actors. Ethnographically rich and unflinchingly critical, Mortal Doubt illuminates the maras' role in making and mooring collective terror in Guatemala City and beyond"--Provided by publisher
Analysis brutal organizations
collective terror
contract killings
criminals
drug trade
extortion
gang dominated neighborhoods
gang violence
gangs
guatemala city
guatemalans
insecure life
maras
migration
new era of violence
police precincts
postwar violence
prisons
social order
state terror
us deportation
violent crime
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on November 29, 2018)
Subject Gangs -- Guatemala -- Guatemala
Violence -- Guatemala -- Guatemala
SOCIAL SCIENCE -- Anthropology -- Cultural.
Gangs
Social conditions
Violence
SUBJECT Guatemala (Guatemala) -- Social conditions
Subject Guatemala -- Guatemala
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2018018645
ISBN 9780520969599
0520969596