Religions of Latin America: Mexico, Peru and El Caribe
ANTH E-184 / HDS 3705
Spring 2015
Wednesday 1-3 PM
Sever Hall 102
Harvard University
Professor Davíd Carrasco
Neil L. Rudenstine Professor for the Study of Latin America, Harvard University
([email protected])
Course Summary
Latin America, called by Eduardo Galeano "a despised and beloved land," has developed some
of the most dramatic and multicolored religious ideas, symbols, myths, sexualities, music and
performances in world history. In fact, what we call ‘Religion’ evolved into expressions that
‘were new and different from anything else in the world’ during Latin American history. This
course examines diverse and complex religious experiences and expressions of Latin American
and Latino cultures with special focus on Mexico, the Mexican Americas, Peru and El Caribe.
Our study of the religious imaginations of what Pablo Neruda referred to as "the splendid
multiplicity of the Americas" will be focused by three categories employed in the academic
disciplines of the history of religions and post colonial studies: (1) sacred places i.e. city,
church, shrine, miraculous objects, human body; (2) ritual performances and the
carnivalesque i.e. human sacrifice, conversion, dance, pilgrimage, revolt and 3) religious
monotheism/ecclesia and resistance/hybridity i.e. Christianity, Inquisition, Santeria,
Mestizaje. The course’s theoretical approach emerges from the writings of Mircea Eliade, Peter
Berger, Clifford Geertz, Mikhail Bakhtin, William Taylor and Franz Fanon. We will look at
the figures and work of Octavio Paz, Carlos Fuentes, Gabriel García Márquez, Junot Diaz,
John Phillip Santos, Frida Kahlo, Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz, Afro-Caribe rites of passage,
miracles and shrines, race mixture, Liberation Theology, and the dexterity of gender and
Latino arts. We will weave together contexts, considering history as an encuentro between past,
present and future.
Different from earlier versions of the course, this semester will strive for a more integral view
of the history of Spanish imperialism and the religious legitimations of a) the social
stratifications of races/ethnicities/genders, b) enormous wealth under the control of
ecclesiastical and royal institutions and c) the world view and punitive actions of the Holy
Office of the Inquisition as an instrument of control over a series of inheritances; inheritances
of lands, codices, laborers, titles, human bodies, cultural practices, material cultures and
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memories. The course relates sacred cosmologies to technological cosmologies at various stages
of Latin American history.
What is Religion?
Religion is viewed, not as a cordoned off dimension within pre-Hispanic, colonial and post
colonial societies but as experiences and expressions pervasive in the daily life and thought of
Latin American and Latino/a peoples. Following William B. Taylor’s view of history as ‘a
restless discipline of context’, the first half of the course will be guided by illuminating and
engaging documentary accounts of the ties between religiosity and imperial states (Aztec, Inca,
Spanish) and colonial contexts, primarily in the colonial heartlands around Mexico City and
Lima, Peru. The second half of the course will branch into the carnivalesque and hybrid
expressions of Caribe traditions, the novels of Garcia Marquez, Junot Diaz and Patrick
Chamoiseau, the art and life of Frida Kahlo, Liberation Theology and the memoir of the
Chicano artist John Phillip Santos.
Drawing from the dynamic methods of Religious Studies, the course poses a robust debate
between the writings of Mircea Eliade (hierophanies, sacred space/time, the terror of history)
and Peter Berger (the social construction of religion/nomos/legitimation, a shield against
terror) with timely detours into the writings of Mikhael Baktin, Franz Fanon, Sigmund Freud,
Charles Long and Victor Turner.
The course will also offer two distinct features: 1.) On a weekly basis, the important DJ and
music historian of Latin American and Latino/a music, Betto Arcos, will provide the class with
an introduction to musical genres that reflect the rich histories we will be studying. 2.) We will
arrange optional field trips to both the Peabody Museum at Harvard and the Museum of Fine
Arts in Boston. Students interested in specific movements, sites, countries and practices
beyond Mexico and Peru will be able to pursue their interests in the second half of the course
and write a final paper/exam on based on their interests.
Required Readings:
Carrasco, Davíd & Law, Jane Marie. Eds. Waiting for the Dawn: Mircea Eliade in
Perspective, University Press of Colorado
Castillo de, Bernal Diaz History of the Conquest of New Spain ed. Carrasco, David,
University of New Mexico Press
Chamoiseau, Patrick, Texaco
Herrera, Heyden, Frida Kahlo; The Paintings: Harper Perennial
Marquez, Gabriel Garcia, One Hundred Years of Solitude. Harper Collins
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Mills, Kenneth; William B. Taylor, eds. Colonial Spanish America: A Documentary History
Wilmington: Scholarly Resources Inc., 1998
A choice between Santos, John P, Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation. New York:
Penguin, 2000 and Diaz, Junot, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Recommended:
Paravisini-Gebert, Lizabeth. Creole Religions of the Caribbean: An Introduction from Vodou
and Santeria to Obeah and Espiritismo. New York: New York University Press, 2003.
(excerpts)
Comment on Required Books:
The first half of the course emphasizes two ‘primary texts’ on the Spanish conquest of New
Spain and the colonial encounters between Christianity and indigenous religions. Each of
these texts (The History of the Conquest of New Spain and Colonial Spanish America: A
Documentary History ) will be read with special attention to the interaction between religion,
sacred places, the theology of empire/social stratification and the accumulation and
inheritance of material wealth.
During this section of the course we will engage in a robust debate about the questions “What
is Religion? How was it expressed and constructed in unique ways in Latin America”. Our
guides will be the historian of religions Mircea Eliade and the sociologist Peter Berger who
carried Emile Durkheim’s approach into new pathways of interpretation. We will read
selections from Berger’s classic The Sacred Canopy and Carrasco’s edited volume Waiting for
the Dawn: Mircea Eliade in Perspective. Both Berger and Eliade have a lot to teach us about
religious matters and cosmovision, spirituality and wealth, mythology and authority.
The second half of the course will continue to draw on Eliade and Berger (as well as Mexico
and the Mexican Americas) as we shift to the religious performances and literary
manifestations from El Caribe including the novels of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Patrick
Chamoiseau (One Hundred Years of Solitude and Texaco) as well as several Afro-Caribe
traditions. As in the first part of the class where we also looked at women in the colonial
period including La Malinche and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, we will also focus on the life and
expressions of Frida Kahlo, especially her paintings such as the “Broken Column” (Frida
Kahlo: The Paintings) as an example of Latin American female spirituality. To assist us
understanding these performative expressions we will turn to the dynamic work of Mikhail
Bakhtin and his insights into the carnivalesque body, world, and relationships.
Finally, students have the choice, in an encounter with the work and world view of
liberation theology in relation to a choice between a memoir or a third novel to read. 1)
The work of John Phillip Santos’ Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation (Finalist
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for the National Book Award) which integrates our themes of religious experience, social
domination, hybridity, women’s wisdom, and colonialism as the imperial carnivalesque or
2) Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize,
2008) linking family, science fiction, migration, the imperial carnivalesque, Spanglish and
waiting for the dawn.
Course Requirements:
There will be a take-home mid-term essay exam (8-10 pages) and the option of a take-home
final exam (10 pages) or a paper (10-12 pages) on a topic worked out with the professor. You
will have a week to complete these assignments and they will be submitted to the dropbox on
the course website. In addition to the exams, students are required, as a way to help them keep
focused on the main and minor threads of the course, to make regular weekly postings on the
discussion boards in fulfillment of the participation portion of the grade.
Course Syllabus
I. Orientations: Images and Approaches
January 28:
Introduction: Ways of Approaching Latin America’s Splendid
Multiplicity/Genealogies
Readings:
Eliade, Waiting for the Dawn, “A New Humanism”, “Prologue”
Mills, Taylor, “Introduction: Texts and Images for Colonial History” in
Colonial Spanish America: A Documentary History
Recommended:
“My Grandparents, My Parents, and I, 1936,” Frida Kahlo: The Paintings, Hayden Herrera, p. 17.
February 4:
Methods for Approaching Pre-Hispanic Cities and Spanish Colonial Theatres
of Conversion
Readings:
Diaz del Castillo, History of the Conquest of New Spain “Introduction” plus pp. 1-147, 448-458
Mills, Taylor, “Introduction: Texts and Images for Colonial History” and documents 1, 4, 22,
48 in Colonial Spanish America: A Documentary History
Eliade, Waiting for the Dawn. “A New Humanism”, “Prologue”
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Heyden Herrera, Frida Kahlo: The Paintings pp. 174-178
II. Indigenous and Spanish Imaginations: Places of Power, Wealth and
New World Constructions
February 11:
When Jesus Came, The Corn Mothers Went Away? The ‘Great Encuentro’
as Spiritual Conquest and Land-Grab
Readings:
David Carrasco, History of the Conquest of New Spain pp. 147-263, 389-399
Robert M. Hill II “Political Organization and Development: Post-Conquest Cultures”, Oxford
Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures, vol 3. pp. 14-19 R
Ken Mills and William Taylor, Colonial Latin America; A Documentary History, doc. 2 ,6, 7, 8,-14,
20, 21
Eliade, Waiting for the Dawn, “Waiting for the Dawn”, “From Silkworms to Alchemy”,
“Vocation and Destiny: Savant, Not Saint”, “Sky Moon and Egg”
February 18-25: Priests, ‘Primitives’ and ‘Civilized’ in Latin American Wealth and History:
The Social Construction of Race and Sacrifice
Readings:
Ken Mills and William Taylor, Colonial Latin America; A Documentary History, docs. 3, 15-19, 2224, 42,43,45,47
“Encomienda” vol. 1, 380-381, Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures,
David Carrasco, History of the Conquest of New Spain pp. 263-373, 399-405, 439-448, 458-466
Charles Long, “Primitive/Civilized: The Locus of a Problem pp. 43-61 R
Berger, Peter “Religion as World Construction” R
March 4:
Magistrates of the Sacred: Christianity Performs and Digs Into Earth, Women
and Souls: The Case of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz
Readings:
Mills and Taylor, Colonial Latin America, docs. 25-37
Kathleen Powers, “Colonialism and Women” in Carrasco/Diaz del Castillo
Victor Turner, “Are there universals of performance in myth, ritual and drama?” R, pp. 8-18.
Eliade, Waiting for the Dawn “Sambo”
Berger, “Religion and World Maintenance” R
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Recommended:
Clendinnen, “Ways to the Sacred: Reconstructing ‘Religion’ in Sixteenth Century Mexico” R
March 11:
League of Extraordinary Women: Rise of the Virgins, Miracles and Shrines
Readings:
Mills and Taylor, Colonial Latin America, Part 3, 214-269
Victor Turner, “The Center Out There: Pilgrim’s Goal” R
Scott Sessions, “Inquisition in the New World” R
Dennis Tedlock, “Torture in the Archives: Mayans Meet Europeans” R
Mid Term Examination: The Midterm will allow students to present their own definition of
religion, Latin American religions in relation to two texts/documents we have read this far in
the course: Due March 13th
SPRING BREAK
III. (Asymmetrical) Hybrid Places and Performances in the Contact
Zone
March 25:
Caribe Hybrid Religions: Carnival and the Body
Readings:
Mills and Taylor, Colonial Latin America, doc 40, 43
Patrick Chamoiseau, Texaco
Bakhtin, “Carnivalesque” R
Eliade, “Literary Imagination and Religious Structure”, “A Terrific Illusionist: The Best”
Recommended:
Fanon, “Concerning Violence” R
Octavio Paz, ”Mexico and the United States” R
April 1: The Religious Vision of Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Macondo
Readings:
Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude
“Introduction” in Textual Confrontations: Comparative Readings in Latin American
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Literature”
Eliade, “Literature and Fantasy”, “Vocation and Destiny: Savant, Not Saint”
Nolan, Edward P. “Forbidden Forrest: Eliade as Artist and Shaman” in Eliade,
Waiting for the Dawn
April 8:
Women of the Broken Columns: Frida Kahlo’s Religious
Aesthetics of the Body in Pain
Readings: Heyden Herrera, Frida Kahlo: The Paintings
April 15: Afro-Caribbean Magic and the Carnivalesque: Santeria
Readings: Lizbet Paravisini-Gebert, Creole Religions of the Caribbean excerpts
April 22-29: Latino/a Literatures, Liberation Theology and Waiting for the Dawn: (Guest
Lecture: Professor Maria Luisa Parra on 22nd)
Readings:
or
John Phillip Santos, Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation
The Brief Wondrous Life of
Oscar Wao
Eliade, “The Criterion Group: From Freud to Charlie Chaplin”, “Mircea Eliade: The Self and
the Journey” by Rodney Taylor
Sandra Cypess, “La Malinche as Palimpsest II” in Diaz del Castillo
David Carrasco, “Cuando Dios Y Usted Quiere: Latino Religions Between Social Thought and
Religious Experience” R
Selections from Gustavo Gutiérrez, Virgilio Elizondo and Ana Maria Isasi Díaz
May 6: Reading Week
Final Take Home Essay/Paper May 10
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