Villagers in northern New Mexico refer to the south-facing side of a wall as la resolana, meaning "the place where the sun shines." Every culture has a resolana, a place where the resolaneros--the villagers--gather, dialogue, and reflect on society, culture, and politics. The buried knowledge that emerges from this process may be "pure gold," or el oro del barrio, a metaphor for the culturally contextualized knowledge gathered at the resolana.

Coming from diverse backgrounds in social work, sociology, public administration, literature, history, and education, three modern...