Abstract
Stripped of their historical context, concepts take on a life of their own and end up dictating the lives of others. The chronic dependence on North Atlantic theoretical perspectives has resulted in the reconfiguration of local thinking according to matrices that are foreign to it. In this article we intend to make a reverse journey through the concept of maritorio and its role in a conceptual organization consistent with regional research trajectories and its transformative potential for addressing national issues. The heuristic potential of the concept stems from its empirical proximity to the processes to which it is applied. We conclude that concepts such as maritorio shed light on the ways in which ethnography embedded in local processes can be more fruitful than the mechanical application of imported concepts.