Reinventing the City of the Kings: Postcolonial Modernizations of Lima, 1845-1930
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REINVENTING THE CITY OF THE KINGS: POSTCOLONIAL MODERNIZATIONS OF LIMA, 1845-1930 By JUAN CARLOS CALLIRGOS A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2007 1 © 2007 Juan Carlos Callirgos 2 To Themis, Sebas, and Juanjo 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Research for this study was possible thanks to an International Dissertation Research Fellowship granted by the Social Science Research Council with funds provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and a McLaughlin Dissertation Fellowship granted by the University of Florida College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Preliminary research was conducted thanks to a Preliminary Research Award by the University of Florida Center for Latin American Studies and a Hanger Research Award granted by the Department of History at the University of Florida. The Comisión Fulbright del Perú, the Institute for International Education, and the Department of History at the University of Florida, provided the financial assistance that allowed me to leave Peru to pursue graduate studies at the University of Florida. Finally, A Doctoral Teaching Award granted by the University of Florida Center for Latin American Studies allowed me to return to the U.S. to finish and defend this study. My immense gratitude goes to all those institutions and their staffs. This study is dedicated to my family. I thank Themis, my wife, for her company and encouragement, for making my life rewarding, and for her wisdom, which does not cease to amaze me. I thank my two sons, Sebastián and Juan José, for their precious growth and quotidian love. The three of them give me more joy, pride, and hope than words may ever be able to express. This study has been part of their lives for too long a period of time, so this is for them. This study is also a tribute to my parents, Yolanda and Humberto, for all the sacrifices they have made to give their children opportunities they could not enjoy, and because each of them has a personal way of providing unconditional love and support. Cecilia and Silvia, my sisters, have been an inspiring presence throughout my life, and have always been there when I needed them most. 4 My gratitude goes to all the combinations of Callirgos-Zavala, Patroni, Vargas-Callirgos, Callirgos-Bernos, Castellanos-del Portal, Castellanos-Abarca, Castellanos-Lugón, and Verano- Coca, who are my family’s indispensable network in Lima. Gainesville became home to our family thanks to the company and support of some extraordinary friends who I want to thank: the Osorio-Thurners, Alemán-León, Dutkas, Gianelli-Dutkas, and Pelegrina-Gómez de la Torre have all enriched our lives and become our extended families forever. I have a personal debt with surgeons Albert Rhoton and Patrick Antonelli at Shands Hospital at the University of Florida, who took care of me and my family when I faced a difficult health problem. I will always thank and admire them. My students of anthropology at the Universidad Católica del Perú have shown great patience and tolerance for my obsessions on history and have been an immense motivation for this study. I want to express my gratitude to professors Kathryn Burns, Maria Todorova, and Luise White, at the University of Florida, for their memorable and intellectually stimulating seminars. Dr. White, in particular, has taught me invaluable lessons on Africa and history. I am particularly grateful to Dr. Mark Thurner, my advisor, who has been a splendid professor and friend throughout these years. His intellectual merits –the extraordinary combination of abundant archival and ethnographic research on Latin America, a solid theoretical formation, and an unyielding drive for theory— have been tremendously influential on me, as have his qualities as a person. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...............................................................................................................4 LIST OF FIGURES .........................................................................................................................8 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS........................................................................................................10 ABSTRACT...................................................................................................................................11 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION: POSTCOLONIAL REINVENTIONS OF THE “CITY OF THE KINGS” ..................................................................................................................................12 Dismounting Pizarro: Postcolonial Anxieties over History....................................................12 History, the Nation and the Postcolonial City ........................................................................20 Historicizing History and National Identity Through Urban Transformations ......................36 2 MODERNIZING THE MODERN.........................................................................................61 A New History for a New Nation: A Trajan’s Column in the Plaza de la Constitución .......61 Already and Not Yet Modern: An Ambiguous Synecdoche for Peru ....................................68 A (Fenced-In) Liberator, the Signs of the Zodiac, and Christopher Columbus .....................74 A Republican “Palace of Pizarro” ..........................................................................................82 The Universal Language of Peruanidad/Civilización.............................................................91 “A(nother) Garden to Aromatize the Capital”........................................................................96 The Modern Demolition of the Modern ...............................................................................102 3 THE TIME OF THE NATION AND THE TIME OF CAPITAL .......................................114 A Republican Penitentiary for a Republican Society ...........................................................114 “Silence, Obedience and Labor” Outside the Penitentiary’s Walls......................................124 A National Exposition in the International Time of Capital.................................................139 At The Same Time: The Time of the Nation and the Time of Capital.................................144 4 “ETHNIC THERAPEUTICS”: THE APPEARANCE OF RACE IN SOCIOLOGICAL THOUGHT AFTER THE WAR OF THE PACIFIC...........................................................154 Education: The Scientific Formation of a Virile Population................................................177 The Nation’s Wombs: Women, Race, and the Disappearance of the Private Sphere ..........189 Radical Therapy for a Sick Organism ..................................................................................196 5 MAPPING THE PROLETARIAT AND THE WRETCHED (1895-1910).........................199 Peeping into Enemy Territory: The Literary Construction of the Poor’s Habitats...............199 6 Making a Respectable Working Class..................................................................................214 6 OPENING THE CITY (1895-1910).....................................................................................229 Modern Transformations, Modern Discomforts...................................................................249 7 A NEO MODERN CITY (1919-1930).................................................................................264 The Discourse of Discourse: The Multiple Pasts of the Patria Nueva.................................265 Concrete Discourses: A Lima Nueva for a Patria Nueva.....................................................282 A New Modern Gesture to Forget ........................................................................................302 8 UNFINAL REFLECTIONS .................................................................................................310 Parading History ...................................................................................................................310 History on Every Corner.......................................................................................................316 Postcolonial Modernizations, Postcolonial Denials .............................................................317 LIST OF REFERENCES.............................................................................................................321 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................................343 7 LIST OF FIGURES Figure page 1-1 Pizarro Monument. Removed on April 26, 2003..............................................................60 1-2 Pizarro Plaza and monument before removal. Graffiti reads: “Pizarro mass murderer the Tawantinsuyo repudiates you”.....................................................................................60 2-1 Plaza de la Constitución – featuring Monument to Bolívar unfenced.............................108 2-2 Fenced liberator...............................................................................................................108 2-3 Entrance to the reformed Alameda de los Descalzos.......................................................109 2-4 Reformed Alameda de los Descalzos ..............................................................................109 2-5 Columbus monument at the Alameda de Acho ...............................................................110 2-6 Plaza Mayor – Government Palace to the left (1860)......................................................110