Satisfying needs and negotiating freedom in colonial Spanish American cities

Summary

Unlike archaeological studies that seek to focus on the relations of power and elites, that by means of physical violence and symbolic exerted their domination over other groups assumed to be passive, an approach from practice theories and spaces of contact in which daily practices took place is proposed. It is in these spaces and through everyday activities that curiosity, knowledge and consent made it possible for the majority to survive under the colonial regime, without this implying an unconscious submission. With this purpose two spaces of practices are examined, i) the production of ceramics, in which techniques and ways of doing converged with new decorative styles and forms, that made artisans with different historical and geographical backgrounds aware of the conditions of life imposed on them, and ii) the shops and market places, where the ceramic wares acquired various uses and meanings, both between natives and settlers. The crafts and trades exercised by artisans and merchants as they satisfied domestic and daily needs lead them also to find a place in colonial society, which, by being considered exclusionary and repressive, these groups and their practices have been made invisible in the studies of power.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Connectivity and Communities of Practice in Lowland South America

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 14505