Bamboo that Is Cut: Cultural Landscapes and Built Heritage on the Ecuadorian Coast (Manabí, Ecuador)

Abstract

During the first cocoa expansion period in Ecuador (18th and 19th centuries), bamboo and wood gave rise to a new style of architecture, marked by European influences. Study of these constructions has traditionally been done in monumentalist terms. A significant portion of these structures are in danger of collapse as a result of reduced local conservation policies, inadequate protection standards, and a decline in traditional methods of bamboo exploitation. The research proposes a multidisciplinary study in the southern area of the province of Manabí, with a first ethnographic approach. It analyses the possibilities of development around the protection of the most emblematic urban space of the architecture in guadua, the city of Jipijapa. At the same time, it examines the construction of new «cultural» paradigms in the coastal region of Ecuador as a result of the reformulation of the Ecuadorian State. The new reality situates in the background the traditional «dominant cultural patrimonies», one of the most representative is the architecture of the cocoa period.