The most influential organization within Yorkin is STIBRAWPA, a women-led foundation that advocates for biodiversity conservation, cultural preservation, and economic opportunity. STIBRAWPA primarily functions as an ecological and educational tourism business, offering day tours and overnight packages to tourists interested in learning about Bribri life and culture. The work opportunities that come from these tourism services provide supplemental income to those involved, and roles are shared through a rotation system so everyone can have a turn earning income, whether as a tour guide, canoe driver, cook, server, or cleaner. When someone is chosen for one of these roles, it is said that they have la toca | ‘the touch’. Members who do not receive la toca can still earn small amounts in other ways, like harvesting palmito from the forest for a meal, or selling the produce grown on their farm to the organization. By creating many smaller opportunities for members to be paid, no one is left without income for a drastic amount of time.
There is a Junta Directiva | administrative board that oversees STIBRAWPA, and this department is explicitly composed of women. La Junta Directiva oversees budgets, worker schedules, payments distributions, and much more. Despite the integral role that the board plays, these positions are not viewed as jobs, but as a deber | duty. Those in the directiva occasionally receive income, but only after all other roles have been paid and funds have been set aside for maintenance or new projects. Because of this, STIBRAWPA is not the most replicable, because at its foundation, it is about community, sharing, and gift-giving. It stands as a modern-day example of what it looks like to work together toward a common goal without the intention of profiting from it.
STIBRAWPA was founded by three women (only one of whom remains actively involved) as a way to create sustainable employment opportunities for the community, in turn preserving la naturaleza. If not for these opportunities, residents may turn to extractive options like creating monoculture plantations, logging, or removing integral resources from the surrounding primary forest. But beyond these reasons, STIBRAWPA was also created as a response to decades of machismo | sexism in the community. Before colonization, Bribri culture valued both men’s and women’s contributions to society and daily duties. Women and femininity were deeply respected in Bribri cosmovision, and many winbrus | spirits were feminine. However, Spanish colonization introduced gender inequality and the objectification of women. As the dominant social system, these mentalities were passed down through many generations, becoming a particularly large issue in the 20th century. But STIBRAWPA’s founder, Bernarda Morales Marin, reminded her community of the traditional Bribri ways. She challenged the machismo that had taken root, and stood up for women’s right to work, gather, and live beyond the roles of cooking, cleaning, and childcare.
“El machismo anteriormente era que las mujeres no podíamos tener estudios, las mujeres eran de la casa, de la cocina. Las mujeres no tienen que estudiar. Y sí iban a estudiar son vagas, no eran mujeres para los hombres. Ellos no querian eso. A los papas, ellos no veían a la mujer estudiando, la mujer, la cocina y eso nada más. Cuidar a los niños, eso sí es un trabajo. Pero estudiar, ver, estar en una organización, emprendiendo las mujeres, eso no era de ellos. Ellos veían que eso no era, eso pasar el tiempo, perder tiempo. Para los hombres que tienen que estar en la casa. Segundo que ellos son los que mandan, no las mujeres. Y después que te mandan usted es como, usted es de él, él que lo mueve donde usted quiere, no usted quiere. Eso era así y tan fuerte, tan fuerte que era ese machismo que yo, cuando empecé la organización, eso fue muy difícil para mí, muy difícil. Tuve que cambiar la mentalidad de los hombres y de los jóvenes de que eso no era lo mejor. Y que en nuestra cultura no existe eso. Todo el mundo dice, gente más, dice no, es una cultura existió, pues no existió porque? Vamos a la historia, vamos a la historia y convenza me con la historia, lo que dice la historia. La historia me dice a mí que no hubo machismo y hubo mucho respeto. Eso sí. que hubo, Cuando las mujeres iban a trabajar, iban a hacer la tierra, eso de, como se dice, la jala de piedra para las máquinas que para como el chocolate y todo eso. ¿Quien guiaba el hilo, quien lo guiaba? Las mujeres! No eran solo los hombres, era un conjunto, no era porque no servía para nada. Ellos, ellos decían que esto, ustedes pueden guiarnos el hilo, porque ellos cargando el hombro aquí cada las piedras, ellos no pueden ver allá, pero las mujeres si, y sostienen el mecate para que los hombres no sientan el peso. Entonces las mujeres iban adelante sosteniendo ese mecate. No hubo machismo en nuestra historia. Dice que nosotros somos matrilineal, somos la jefa del clan, nosotros somos los herederos del clan. No dice que los hombres porque hizo ustedes que existieron machismo, no es cierto. Dios cuando dejó la tierra dijo que la tierra era como quien? como la madre de la tierra, como la mamá de nosotros, que nos da de mamá, nos crece y morimos y él nos recibe así es la madre y dio un nombre a eso, como lo dio el nombre, como se llama? Se llama Iriria, que quiere decir Iríria? Iriria es una mujer. Dio un gran ejemplo de que nosotros somos como la madre. Hasta el mismo Dios respetaba eso, el respetó eso y puso así la mamá, el mar, el mar es más grande que la tierra y que dios, que dijo el Dios que el mar se llamará Daye, una mujer, el que va a mandar en este momento, el que manda en este momento es una madre, es una mujer. Entonces porque ustedes me dicen así, yo tuve que convencerlo porque ellos decían lo que como uno es joven, ellos pensaban que nos iba a engañar, porque uno es joven no conoce y en ese tiempo yo no conocí la historia, pero yo me metí a conocer las historias y me di cuenta todo eso, que había una gran importancia de las mujeres y porque hoy los hombres no dicen que nosotros no valemos, nosotros tenemos que estar solo haciendo esto y ellos sí tienen el derecho de hacer lo que quieren y menos nosotros. no puede ser así. Entonces que hoy día los españoles digan que ellos están poniendo derechos de igualdad, eso ya existía en nuestra cultura, la igualdad existía. | “The sexism before was that the women could not study, they were women of the house, of the kitchen, the women didn’t need to study. And if they did go off to study, they were lazy, they weren’t good women for the men. The men didn’t want that . The parents, they had never seen women studying, the women, the kitchen, and that was it. Take care of the kids, this is also a job. But study, be a part of an organization, learn about business, this wasn’t for the women. They saw it as a waste of time, the men believed the women needed to stay in the house. The second aspect is that the men were the ones who were in charge, not the women. And after they were in charge, you were his, he could move you where you wanted, where you didnt want. This was so strong, so strong this sexism that I, when I started the organization, it was very hard for me, very hard. I had to change the mentality of the men and of the children that this wasn’t for the best. And that in our culture, this didn’t exist before. How did it not exist? Lets go to the history, look at the history and convince me with the history, what does it say? The history tells me that there was no sexism and that there was much respect. This, yes. That there was, when the women came to work, came to work the land, with the, what’s it called, the stone pull for the machines that make the chocolate and all that, who guided the thread, who guided it? The women! It wasn’t just the men, it was a combined effort, it wasn’t because it was useless. They said that you can guide the thread, because they were carrying the stone on their shoulders, they couldn’t see there, but the women could, and they supported the rope so that the men would feel the weight less. So the women went ahead supporting the rope. There wasn’t sexism in our history. He (God) says we are matrilineal, that we are the head of our clans, we are the heirs of our clans. He doesn’t say the men because the men created machismo, and that was true. When God created Earth, he said that the Earth was like what? Like the mother of the earth, the mother of us, we grow and we die and he receives us just like a mother, and he gave Earth a name, what was her name? Her name is Iriria, what does Iriria mean? Iriria is a woman. God gave a grand example of who we are as mothers. God respected this, he respected it and he put, just like the mother, the ocean, the ocean is larger than all of the land on Earth, and what did God say? He said that the ocean would be called Daye, a woman, He who is in charge at this moment [decided this]. She is a mother, a woman. So why did they tell me this? I had to convince them because they said, because when someone is young, they are going to be decieving, and at this time I didn’t know our history, but I went to learn about it and I learned all this, that where was great importance of the women and because today the men say they don’t value us, that we have to do only these things but that they have the right to do what they want, not us. It cannot be this way. So today, the Spanish say that they are implementing equality rights, but this already existed in our culture before. Equality already existed.” -Bernarda Morales Marin
“Entonces esas cosas cambió mucho la gente Yorkin, no el total, pero poco a poco van cambiando eso. ya con los ejemplos, con las cosas, ya va cambiando. Ya las mujeres estamos más, con más valor, que es cierto, porque nosotros no estamos, nosotros somos líderes también.” | “So these things changed the people in Yorkin a lot, not all at once, but little by little they changed. With these examples, with these things, it is changing. And the women are more, with more worth, this is true, because we are, we are leaders too.” -Bernarda Morales Marin
Today, STIBRAWPA is a unifying force. Its roots are community-oriented, not profit-driven. Members who participate do so to have enough to put food on the table, or to buy small comforts. There is enough financial incentive to want to be part of it, but it does not encompass the entire reason of being involved. STIBRAWPA operates on a functional level, so it can continue to be a reliable, supportive opportunity for those who choose to be a part of it. For communities whose values align with this, STIBRAWPA is often positioned as a model for other Indigenous communities to create if they face similar battles with environmental change, cultural preservation, and economic demand.
STIBRAWPA’s bottom-up design exemplifies where Yorkin’s priorities lie: with their people. This framework is innate, and incredibly beautiful. Yorkin exists in social systems that many will only ever read about: gift economy, relationship-based living, and a society distant from capitalism– alive and thriving, in real life.
STIBRAWPA played an incredibly fundamental role in the production of this research. The day we arrived in Yorkin, La Junta Directiva met with us and helped us coordinate our primary interviews with 9 long-standing Yorkin families. During these interviews, many people expressed a deep gratitude for the work that STIBRAWPA is doing for Yorkin, and informants who were a part of la directiva were clearly committed to serving their community in any capacity they could. STIBRAWPA has completely changed the culture of Yorkin for the better. If you are inspired by this organization, or enjoyed reading about the stories of Yorkin, please consider donating to La Asociacion STIBRAWPA through the link pasted below.
https://www.amigosofcostarica.org/affiliates/stibrawpa
STIBRAWPA’s Official Website
Phases and Faces of Change | Fases y caras de Cambio 