For more than 20 years, January has been a month of political education and organizing in San Diego, inspired by the Zapatistas of Chiapas, Mexico. In January of 1994, indigenous people in the Chiapas city of San Cristobal de las Casas protested against the Mexican government g on to the North American Free Trade Agreement—this group was the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Initially taking up arms and later setting them down, the Zapatistas created a movement centered on the rights of indigenous peoples, their displacement from their lands, and rectifying the poverty they were experiencing, according to Ymoat Luna, a cultural worker, community organizer and activist, and board member of Centro Cultural de la Raza in Balboa Park. “Enero Zapatista” is a month-long celebration in San Diego in commemoration of the movement.
“It’s really an experiment we’ve been doing every year as activists that are inspired by Zapatismo, to practice, to organize across our own differences, across each other’s struggles and our various struggles, to really organize a whole month of political education for the community of San Diego and Tijuana,” she says. “For us, we take this month of providing political education, culturally conscious events that provide the political education for the next generation in San Diego.”
The schedule of activities, which extends into February and March, includes activities like an art exhibition, film series, book readings and discussions, teach-ins, and workshops at Centro. Today, there is a mural painting and discussion in Tijuana from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. (leaving from the Iris Avenue trolley station), and a workshop hosted by the Council on American-Islamic Relations from 6 to 9 p.m. at Centro. On Feb. 8, there’s a 5K at Larsen Field in of Palestine, and a Mayan fire ceremony at Centro.
Luna, who’s been a member of the coordinating committee for “Enero Zapatista” for the past 18 years, took some time to talk about the movement, its influence, and the grassroots work it’s inspired in San Diego and beyond. (This interview has been edited for length and clarity. )
Q: What is “Enero Zapatista”? What happened in January of 1994?
A: “Enero Zapatista” is a movement that was inspired by an uprising that took place in 1994. Various ethnicities of Mayan descent rose up against the Mexican government protesting against NAFTA (North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement) that was signed at that time. On Jan. 1, they kind of took over different points within the city of San Cristobal de las Casas. What’s very interesting about this movement is that they were bearing arms, but a few months later, they decided to drop their arms. In their communiques, when they first rose up in 1994, they became a symbol of people who were oppressed and also of indigenous people, bringing visibility to indigenous people’s poverty and displacement and marginalization of their own territories.
In 1994 in Mexico, NAFTA was something that was celebrated by the wealthy class, something that was going to bring more modernization to Mexico, but it absolutely ignored the poverty and the displacement and the marginalization of indigenous people throughout Mexico. So, there was this movement that was very unexpected to the upper class, and it rose up in arms and took control of various, important locations in Chiapas. What makes it very relevant today is that it happened in 1994, and this past January of 2025 was celebrating 31 years of that indigenous uprising movement that is still extremely present in the state of Chiapas. They’ve been able to occupy their their indigenous lands. They kind of have their own sovereignty within the Mexican government, so the Mexican government does not enter into these territories. It definitely represents to the world, an international movement that’s very influenced by indigenous people being able to practice their own autonomy. It really represents an example of a movement that was able to-without violence, without continuing to have arms-still be a relevant, impressive movement to preserve their land and their language and their own way of life without any political, any monetary from the government. That is something that is still one of the largest living movements that has succeeded and continues to succeed and exist within Mexican territory, in a very interesting relationship with the state of Mexico. Currently, it continues to still receive a lot of aggression with the military. In Chiapas, there’s so many military checkpoints and there’s also the state trying to encroach on their territories. So, there is a lot of alarm and caution with the Zapatistas about all of these different political changes that are happening within the state of Chiapas.
Q: How is San Diego involved in the history of this movement?
A: In San Diego, it’s been 21 years of organizing this month-long series of politically- and culturally-conscious events and it’s completely grassroots. We do a call-out around August and we basically call out for people from various identities, ideologies, politics, to come and organize under the seven Zapatista principles that allow collective organizations to have a different approach in organizing within community, with a framework that’s more horizontal. …There’s not one person who’s in charge, we are a select coordinating committee of various collectives. We did the call-out and there were 30 organizations that basically said they want to have an event within the month of Zapatista. So, the whole month, people are able to network with one another and present the struggles that are happening here in San Diego. It’s really providing the political education to inform our community.
That’s one of the things that the Zapatistas says, is that ‘We don’t want you to come and bring the solidarity to Chiapas. That was something that happened in the first 10 years of the Zapatista uprising and various gatherings,’ what they told us, the people that were inspired by Zapatismo, is ‘Go organize in your own countries, go organize in your own neighborhoods. You don’t need to come and copy what we’re doing. Learn to organize in your own communities. You need to be able to create and imagine those worlds by being able to organize and make those things happen.’ So, I always tell people that it’s not an ideology, but a bridge where all of these people really connect and organize in ways that otherwise wouldn’t happen. What you have within the Zapatista are nonprofits that are engaged with the work—you have people who are more left, considered more communist, more socialist—so it encomes every form of ideology, but we come with the consensus that we’re going to organize under these seven principles because we all want to be able to provide an event that provides a political education during the month-long series of events in Enero Zapatista in San Diego.
Q: This year’s theme for Enero Zapatista is “We Teach Life: Towards Different Geographies and Calendars.” What does this mean, exactly? What is the significance of different geographies, different calendars?
A: This exhibit is part of a series called “Borderland Visions,” a four-part series exhibition that the Centro is hosting. We were able to receive funding from the Mellon Foundation. It’s the first time that the center received funding from a big institution, and it provides capital and resources to be able to have operational . So, because of that, we were able to pitch the idea of this “Borderlands Visions.” This is the third exhibit in the two years, which is focused on different geographies and calendars, drawing on being able to rethink, or reimagine, how we can see the experience of the borderlands while living here in San Diego or Tijuana. The exhibit has two goals: drawing attention to how the borders operate differently across different geographies, but also highlight the refusal of the mappings of power that would make these geographies. It’s also in solidarity of the different people who have lived there; these borders are not new, they have been here for the last 100 years, but before that, there weren’t these imposed borders. It seems like, within our politics, this idea of borders and security has really increased, not just here, but all over the world. Here, living in a binational community where we have families living on both sides of the border with some able to cross and others not able to cross, and the different environmental effects that causes, we did this call-out. You’ll see when you come to the exhibit that many people responded to the call-out very differently, and wanted to come and expand, or present, what this means to them, living within their own geographies; how borders are imposed in their daily livelihoods. So, “We Teach Life” is how we wanted to bring visibility, not just focusing on the Tijuana border, but borders worldwide. I think this is also something that includes the continued migration, displacement, the activism that’s happening worldwide.
This particular poem, “We Teach Life, Sir” is from a Palestinian poet, Rafeef Ziadah, and we wanted to also bring visibility to the ongoing genocide that was happening in Palestine. We see how the Palestinian movement has inspired and provided a lot of life and teaching to the world, to our own communities; the aspect of resistance, but also just being able to survive and scream to the world that their existence is valuable, their humanity is valuable. We wanted to connect those two relationships, not only over here, living within our different challenges of the border here within San Diego/Tijuana, but also being able to acknowledge the different struggles that are happening worldwide, especially with the Palestinians and how that pride has also resonated with the young people and organizers here, on the ground. This is something they can connect, that is also part of their daily lives because they see it on their screens every day and we couldn’t just ignore it. It’s something that a lot of the art that was submitted was also making that visibility present.
Q: What is included in the exhibition that is on display through the end of March? How many artists/pieces are included in this exhibition?
A: I believe there are at least 35 pieces. This is the first time we’ve had to be kind of selective because we’re planning to create a catalog of the four series of exhibitions in the “Borderland Visions,” so for the first time we had to say no to some of the art that was submitted. Normally, we would take everything during “Enero Zapatista,” but we needed to really find art that was unique and that had not been shown before. We have a lot of binational artists, some of them live in Tijuana, and we prioritize artists who were more regional because they bring more visibility to what’s happening here, at the border. Then, we also have artists who sent their art from Mexico, from Oakland, from New York. So, you’ll be able to see them during the showcase. One of the artists from Oakland is a very well known, grassroots political artist in the Bay Area and a lot of his art is everywhere, especially right now. We also have Roberto Pozos, a Chicano muralist/artist. There’s different art that is showcased when you walk in. You’re able to see the different images of the border, people trying to cross the border, and the geography and landscape of the San Diego/Tijuana border. Then, there’s another part of the exhibit where people submitted more art that was more focused on flora and fauna, the landscape and flowers within those borders. A lot of that art encomes flowers and landscapes, oceans. Then, you have Evan Apodaca, who showcases how people were displaced from their communities. He brings a piece about a community in LA that was displaced in the 1970s. We also have two films: one is called “The Humanity Across Stories of Resistance” by Daniela Muruato Moreno and it was facilitated by Magdalena Ramirez. This film is about how families live their daily lives in San Diego and their diversity-their gardens, their houses, their cooking-the richness of culture in San Diego and migrants and how they keep the community vibrant. There’s another short film, “Atestiguar,” by Danielle Cosmes Aguilar, which basically shows images and film about Whiskey 8 (a section of the U.S.-Mexico border in San Ysidro). It’s the outdoor area for migrants where they’re waiting for asylum. Some of them camp there, some of them are dropped there, and this film, “Atestiguar,” which means “witness,” shows what a day at Whiskey 8 looks like. There’s Pedro Rios from AFSC (American Friends Service Committee) who talks about the humanitarian work that happens there, that their organization does on a regular basis and has continued to do since the last Trump istration, and Whiskey 8 is still a place where humanitarian aid is dropped and provided on a daily basis.
Q: What do you hope people take from this exhibition and its accompanying programs? What do you hope people learn about “Enero Zapatista”?
A: I think, for those who come for the first time, people might perceive this as we’re trying to radicalize young people, and it can be perceived that way; but when you learn about Zapatismo and why it has been a movement that continues to inspire young people and grassroots organizations all over the world, it’s because of the peaceful presence, because they decided to go out there without their guns, they decided to say that their word, their voice, their presence is their only weapon. By creating space in our own community, making space at the Centro to showcase our culture, identities, and different forms of thinking without discriminating or putting one down over another, it does provide a home and a safe space for organizations and groups to come and get informed about something they want to do. They want to be able to get more involved with community, whether that be with tenants’ rights, migrants’ rights, doing more mutual aid efforts at the border, or creating gardens and doing more food sovereignty. Basically, you get a taste of all of these different things that are happening, that people are doing in San Diego and Tijuana, and whatever calls to you to organize, you can get informed and go for it. It’s a showcase of people doing really good work and young people get inspired and motivated to be able to choose something that calls to them and to organize. I think, more than anything, the message is to organize. I think we live in a very precarious time where we do need to be more involved and engaged in our community, and it looks differently for everybody. We’re not here to impose that this is the only way, absolutely not; we’re here to basically say that these are different organizations, different collectives doing the work. If you see something that inspires you, then you can participate, and you can create your own collective if you don’t see it here. Through these principles, we want to really encourage young people and other people to network and organize in their own communities and to not be afraid, and know that there is solidarity among different people who are struggling within our communities. There is solidarity and you’re not alone in facing whatever fears are being brought forth at this time within our communities.
