|
|
This first half of a two-semester introduction to the history
of Latin America centers on the colonial period: the years of
Spanish and Portuguese colonization from the early sixteenth century
to the beginning of mainland Latin American nationhood in the
nineteenth century.
What does it mean to speak of "Latin America" or to
say that "Latin America was becoming Latin American"
during these colonial centuries? To address this question in some
of its regional complexities and changes, special attention will
be given in the readings and lectures to the encounters, struggles,
and adjustments of Europeans and native Americans; changing institutions
and ideas about empire; Indians and other non-Europeans under
colonial rule in the core areas of highland Spanish America; structures
of society and thought as they formed and changed; some individual
lives; local variants; and movements toward national independence.
Portuguese America enters the course in several lectures and readings-with
a colonial history in its own right, but especially for comparison
to Spanish American developments and this idea of "Latin
America." The chronological boundary for the mid-term examination
is the late sixteenth century (the end of Peter Bakewell's "formative"
period, when certain broad patterns of colonial life in the core
areas had become apparent).
Some class time every week will be devoted to slides of buildings,
paintings, sculpture, and other artifacts from the times and places
under study. Visual images are also part of your reading in Mills
and Taylor. As Octavio Paz, Mexico's famous poet, essayist, and
historian of ideas, said, "architecture is the mirror of
societies, but a mirror that shows enigmatic images that we must
decipher." The images you will see are intended to illustrate,
amplify, or redirect themes and changes raised in the lectures
and other readings, and to give you another way to document life
and thought in the colonial period. These images need to be "deciphered"
or at least reckoned with-located in time and space, and connected
to your larger study of Latin America's colonial history. As the
images in Mills & Taylor are meant to suggest, they are not
only illustrations of something else; they are sources in their
own right. As you work toward an understanding of this history,
some of the images should be as important to you as the readings
and lectures.
Examinations:
1. Map Quiz during second-week section
meetings on the central areas of Latin America during the 16th,
17th, and 18th centuries, the nations of modern Latin America,
colonial provinces, and a few key cities and physical features.
See the attached guide, and work from copies of the outline map
of Latin America distributed in class.
2. Mid-term essay examination on October 17. Study questions will
be distributed two weeks before the exam. (25% of final grade)
3. Final examination, December 19, 12:30-3:30 (comprehensive,
but with emphasis on material covered since the mid-term). The
final will consist of one extended essay drawn from a group of
study questions, plus several short essays based on readings and
class sessions. (35% of final grade)
Short Essays: Two three-page essays on Victors and Vanquished (due in the lecture meeting at the end of Week 4) and Bakewell's Silver and Entrepreneurship (due in the section meeting in Week 10). The purpose of these short essays is to explore an idea about colonial Latin American history in these readings and locate it in time. Writing the essay on Silver and Entrepreneurship will also help you prepare for discussion of this reading. See the appended study questions and essay assignments for these readings. (20% of the final grade)
Discussion Sections: A key to success in this course is consistent engagement and preparation. The weekly section meetings are your opportunities to reckon with this history in conversation and prepare for the exams. Do the readings, attend the lectures, and come prepared to discuss them. Do not expect your GSI to deliver another lecture or summarize the reading during the section meeting. 20% of the final grade is based on her evaluation of your contributions to these meetings.
Readings (paperback copies available at the ASUC Bookstore
and Ned's)
Peter Bakewell, A History of Latin America (a substantial textbook,
but not a substitute for lectures, section meetings, and other
readings)
Kenneth Mills & William Taylor (eds.), Colonial Spanish America:
A Documentary History (a sourcebook, mainly of primary sources,
including pictorial materials)
Stuart B. Schwartz (ed.), Victors and Vanquished: Spanish and
Nahua Views of the Conquest of Mexico (primary sources on the
conquest of the Valley of Mexico, both Spanish and Native American)
Inga Clendinnen, Ambivalent Conquests: Maya and Spaniard in Yucatán,
1517-1570 (See attached study guide.)
Peter Bakewell, Silver and Entrepreneurship in 17th-Century Potosí:
The Life and Times of Antonio López de Quiroga
To read on reserve in Moffitt Library: three short selections in David Sweet & Gary Nash (eds.) Struggle and Survival in Colonial America
SCHEDULE OF LECTURE MEETINGS AND ASSIGNMENTS
Week 1
Aug. 29 Introduction to the course
Aug. 31 New World Places, Old World Directions
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 1; Mills & Taylor, Introduction
(xv-xxiv)
Week 2 Map quiz in section
meetings this week
Sept. 5 Iberian Directions (view Carlos Fuentes's "The Virgin
and the Bull")
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 3; Mills & Taylor, selection 5
Sept. 7 Native American Societies I: Mesoamerica and Tenochtitlan
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 2; Mills & Taylor, selections
1-4
Week 3
Sept. 12 Native American Societies: South America and Cuzco
Read Bakewell, History, chs. 4, 5; Mills & Taylor, selection
6
Sept. 14 The Caribbean, 1492-1550: Destination and Gateway
Read Schwartz, pp. 1-74; Mills & Taylor, selections 8-11
Week 4
Sept. 19 Conquest (view Carlos Fuentes's "The Conquest of
the Gods")
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 6; Schwartz, pp. 75-243
Sept. 21 Patterns of Conquest and its Limits. Essay on Victors
and Vanquished due.
Week 5
Sept. 26 Structuring a Colonial Regime in the 16th Century
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 7; Mills & Taylor, selections
15-17
Sept. 28 Yoke of Flowers: The "Spiritual Conquest"
Read Bakewell, ch. 8; Clendinnen, Part I; Mills & Taylor,
Selections 7, 12, 18, 22, 23
Week 6 Clendinnen essay due in section meeting this
week
Oct. 3 Yoke of Iron: Indians and Africans in the Early Colonial
Period
Read Clendinnen, Part II; Bakewell, History, ch. 9; Mills &
Taylor, selections 13, 14, 19, 20, 21, 24
Oct. 5 The Golden Eggs: Mining, Trade, Taxes and Labor in a Directed
Economy
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 10
Week 7
Oct. 10 Brazil in the Early Colonial Period
Read Bakewell, History, pp. 298-338, 34-35; Sweet & Nash,
ch. 8.
Oct. 12 (Día de la Raza) Colonial Consolidations: Appraisal
of 16th-century patterns and
the idea of a "conquest culture"
Week 8
Oct. 17 MID-TERM EXAMINATION
Oct. 19 A 17th-century Depression?
Read Bakewell, Silver and Entrepreneurship, prologue, ch. 1
Week 9
Oct. 24 Established Colonies (view Carlos Fuentes's "The
Age of Gold")
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 11
Oct. 26 The Other West: "Baroque" Culture and Society
Read Sweet & Nash, ch. 18; Mills & Taylor, selections
25, 26, 27, 33, 35
Week 10 Silver and Entrepreneurship essay due in section
meeting this week
Oct. 31 "Baroque" Religion and Art
Read Bakewell, Silver and Entrepreneurship, chs. 2-4, Conclusion;
Mills & Taylor, selections 29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 37
Nov. 2 African Slavery and African Americans in Spanish America
Read Mills & Taylor, selections 28, 40; Sweet & Nash,
ch. 5
Week 11
Nov. 7 Bourbon Rule: A Century of Reform?
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 12; Mills & Taylor, selection
39
Nov. 9 18th-Century Transformations: New Centers, Old and New
Structures
Read Mills & Taylor, selections 38, 41, 44, 46
Week 12
Nov. 14 Late Colonial Society and Bourbon Social Engineering
Read Mills & Taylor, selections 42, 45
Nov. 16 Art and Time in the Late Colonial Period
Week 13
Nov. 21 Brazil in the 18th-Century: A Telescoped Colonial History
Read Bakewell, History, pp. 338-351; Sweet & Nash, chs. 6,
14.
Week 14
Nov. 28 Conflict in the 18th Century and Possible Origins of National
Indep.
Read Mills & Taylor, selections 43, 47, 48
Nov. 30 Movements for Independence I
Read Bakewell, History, ch. 14
Week 15
Dec. 5 Movements for Independence II
Read Mills & Taylor, selections 49, 50
Dec. 7 The Colonial Heritage of Latin America
|