Canarian Wrestling (1840–2023): From the Guanche That We Hold within to the Peasant That We Must Exorcise

Abstract

Canarian Wrestling is a traditional form of wrestling that originates in the Canary Islands. Like other traditional fights, it has experienced fair play processes since the middle of the nineteenth century. The outcome of this is asymmetrically relating to three different elements. One such element is that which links Canarian Wrestling to the fighting engaged in by the ancient indigenous peoples, the Guanches, who resided on the islands at the time in which they were conquered. Thus, Canarian Wrestling has taken up the baton to give testimony to and prolong the survival of Guanche heritage by representing and encapsulating values that are linked to indigenous history and that which is authentically Canarian (nobility, tradition, respect towards a defeated opponent, etc.).

Without losing sight of the fact that these representations are subject to a changing relationship, the present work reveals the way in which the relationship between the imagined indigenous person and Canarian Wrestling has been constructed and discussed over the course of the last two centuries, between 1830 and the present day. Further, the work discusses the way in which the resultant process of ethnicity is subjected to constant pressures, giving rise to the construction and legitimisation of identities whose coexistence is highly complex.