Shekuita O El Mal Trueno: Performative Documentary, Ontological Conflicts, And Decolonization Of Reality

This paper analyzes the ontological implications and the performative nature of the documentary Shekuita o el mal trueno, released in 2017 by a Wiwa indigenous audiovisual production group in Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia. The documentary explores the causes, doubts and consequences of a sad incident that happened three years earlier: a lightning strike on a Wiwas ceremonial building, which killed nearly a dozen leaders. Based on the contrast between the scientific explanations of the tragedy and those that the spiritual authorities of the community have investigated according to their relational ontologies and based on a quasi-ethnographic fieldwork during the filming process, we seek to account for a specific case of decolonization of reality and of the efforts of an indigenous community for free expression and autonomous representation. We find that this documentary opens doors to other worlds in an artistic way, told in an unsubmissive way by an indigenous community that challenges us. We conclude that the Wiwa perform a reality that is not necessarily the one they lived through, but one that strategically allows them to reach the reality they want to recover more easily. The paper attempts to contribute to the visibility of other ontologies other than the naturalistic one, to show self-criticism of it and to show how the audiovisual is a propitious space to decolonize reality.