Africans in Colonial Mexico: Absolutism, Christianity, and Afro-Creole Consciousness, 1570-1640"Colonial Mexico was home to the largest population of free and slave Africans in the New World. This book is a study of this population, chiefly in the Mexico City area. It looks at the ways in which slaves and free blacks learned to make their way in a culture of state and religious absolutism. Herman L. Bennett is particularly interested in the way blacks learned to use Spanish and ecclesiastical legal institutions to create a semblance of cultural autonomy, while at the same time enmeshing themselves and their descendants with the dominant culture. This distinctive aspect of Afro-Mexican creolization in an absolutist culture has been little studied. Bennett has gone to the secular and ecclesiastical court records and teased out much new information about the lives of slaves and free blacks, the ways in which their lives were regulated by the government and the Church, the impact upon them of the Inquisition, their legal status in marriage, and their rights and obligations as Christian subjects."--BOOK JACKET. Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. |
Contents
Soiled Gods and the Formation of a Slave Society | 14 |
Africans and Christian Conjugality | 33 |
Persons of African Descent before | 51 |
Copyright | |
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Africans in Colonial Mexico: Absolutism, Christianity, and Afro-Creole ... Herman L. Bennett No preview available - 2005 |
Common terms and phrases
African descent African presence alguacil Alonso Angolan Antón Antonío Antonio Martín Audiencia authority Beatriz behavior bigamy black creole bozales bride canon law Catalina Catholic Christian Church clergy Colonial Mexico Congo creole Cristóbal Cruz cultural defined Despite Domingo ecclesiastical endogamy enslaved Africans enslaved persons ethnicity expediente folios Francisco Granados free black free mulatto Gaspar gender Gracía household husband Ibid identities Indian Indies indigenous Indio individuals Inés informed initial Inquisición 134 Inquisition Inquisition's inquisitors interaction Isabel Díaz Juan de Cintra Juan Francisco Juan's Juana known the couple labor ladinos Leonor lived Luísa manifested Manuel marriage license marriage petition marriage witnesses married Martín masters Matrimonios mestizo Mexican Inquisition Mexico City Miguel mulatto Nahuas negra negro Nicolás Oaxaca officials Pérez persons of African population proceedings provisor Puebla relationship represented república resided Santo Oficio seventeenth century slave trade slavery social Spain Spaniards status testified testimony tribunal underscores University Press Veracruz wife York