The increasing migration of indigenous people from Latin America to the United States signals a new horizon for the study of indigeneity—complexly understood as subjectivities, knowledge, and practices of the earliest human inhabitants of a particular place and including legal and racial identities that refer to these people. Focusing on indigenous migration to San Francisco, California, I explore how government, service providers, and community organizations respond to the arrival of new ethnic groups while also contributing to an expanding Urban Indian collective identity. In addition to reviewing such governmental practices as the creation of new census categories and related responses to indigenous ethnic diversity, I illustrate how some members of a diverse Urban Indian population unite through participation in rituals such as the Maya Waqxaqi’ B’atz’ (Day of Human Perfection), transplanted to San Francisco from Guatemala. The rituals recall homelands near and far in a broader social imagination about being and belonging in the world. The social imagination, borne in part through migration and diaspora, acknowledges the local and the particular in a framework of shared values about what it means to be human. I analyze this meaning making as cosmopolitanism in practice. By merging indigeneity and cosmopolitanism, I join other scholars who strive to decenter classical notions of cosmopolitan “worldliness,” drawing attention to alternative sources of beneficent sociality and for cultivating humanity.

In postwar El Salvador, high levels of violence and social polarization continue to destabilize a fragmented society. In an effort to combat this instability, projects have emerged to foster social reconstruction by promoting national culture and identity. The goal of international humanitarian intervention in these projects is to link national cultural campaigns to universally accepted values and the practice of democratic citizenship (including human rights). This is in contrast to other national projects that sought to develop common social bonds by promoting the uniqueness of El Salvador's culture, history, and identity. This article examines two postwar projects: UNESCO's pilot "Culture of Peace Program for El Salvador" and a Salvadoran government "Values Program" newly introduced into the national educational curriculum. The UNESCO project was an experiment in global governance, in that it attempts to inform state and society in El Salvador of the cultural values and expectations for participation in a global community. The second program, designed to transform society by inculcating select cultural values, is influenced by the earlier UNESCO iniative, especially in the program's focus on universal values and its emphasis on the ideals of democratic citizenship. This article illustrates the interplay of global and localized governance strategies as social actors in El Salvador debate, adapt, and transform cultural prescriptions for strengthening postwar society.The culture of peace is a fundamental process of human development which centers its attention on the needs and aspirations of the individual person and that generates the conditions which can assure a worthy, full and prosperous life for all, within a natural and cultural environment that is safe, secure and creative.Ministry of Education of the Government of El Salvador and other governmental and non-governmental organizations and with the cooperation of UNESCO (1993)

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