Encyclopedia of Race and Racism, Vol2 – Finals/ 10/4/2007 13:09 Page 166 Indigenismo in Mexico The codification of slave laws across North America Usner, Daniel H., Jr. 1992. Indians, Settlers & Slaves in a Frontier from the 1660s through the 1720s effectively erased the Exchange Economy: The Lower Mississippi Valley before 1783. Indian identity of large numbers of Indians who were Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. living as slaves or servants. Though Indians were men- tioned in colonial slave laws, the rise of a black majority Denise Ileana Bossy (combined with binary ideas of race as black and white) doomed Indians who were enslaved to become effectively ‘‘black’’ in the eyes of most colonists. Nonetheless, Indian slaves maintained their own cultural identities. INDIGENISMO Their impact on slave cultures and slave religions has yet to be fully appreciated. IN MEXICO The concept of race in Mexico is deeply rooted in the SEE ALSO Racial Slave Labor in the Americas; Slavery, xenophobic tendencies of the Spanish colonization. It has Racial; Slavery and Race. been recorded that Herna´nCorte´s (c.1485–1547), the famous Spanish conquistador responsible for the downfall BIBLIOGRAPHY of the Aztec empire, once stated: ‘‘We Spaniards suffer Barr, Juliana. 2005. ‘‘From Captives to Slaves: Commodifying from a disease of the heart which only gold can cure.’’ Indian Women in the Borderlands.’’ Journal of American Corte´s therefore brought an exploitative political philoso- History 92 (1): 19–46. phy to the New World and its indigenous peoples. Since Bossy, Denise. Forthcoming. ‘‘Indian Slavery in Colonial South then Mexico has struggled to come to grips with its history Carolina: Indian and English Contexts, 1670–1730.’’ In and to define its nationalistic identity and place in the Indian Slavery in Colonial America, ed. Alan Gallay. Lincoln: world. The historical periods of Mexico’s development University of Nebraska Press. and public policies can be broken down into the following: Braund, Kathryn E. Holland. 1991. ‘‘The Creek Indians, Blacks, colonization, independence, revolution, modernization, and Slavery.’’ Journal of Southern History 57 (4): 601–636. and neoliberalization. Each is marked by its own particular Brooks, James F. 2002. Captives and Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, set of institutionalized and informal racist policies. and Community in the Southwest Borderlands. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. ROOTS OF INDIGENISMO: Forbes, Jack. 1993. Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. Urbana: COLONIZATION, CONVERSION, University of Illinois Press. AND CORRUPTION Gallay, Alan. 2002. The Indian Slave Trade: The Rise of the Policies regarding race began with allegations of ideolog- English Empire in the American South, 1670–1717. New ical superiority by the Spanish at the time of contact. Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Cortez’s actions are deeply criticized to this day by the Magnaghi, Russell M. 1998. Indian Slavery, Labor, indigenous peoples of the Americas, and ‘‘Columbus Evangelization, and Captivity in the Americas: An Annotated Day’’ has been reformulated by Native peoples as ‘‘Indig- Bibliography. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press. enous Peoples’ Day.’’ Newell, Margaret. 2003. ‘‘The Changing Nature of Indian The imperialistic approach of the Spanish toward Slavery in New England, 1670–1720.’’ In Reinterpreting New the New World was conditioned in large part by the England Indians and the Colonial Experience, edited by Colin G. Calloway and Neal Salisbury, 106–136. Boston: Colonial earlier Christian Reconquest of Spain, during which Society of Massachusetts. Spanish soldiers battled the Moorish population from 711 to 1492 for control of the Iberian Peninsula. View- Perdue, Theda. 1979. Slavery and the Evolution of Cherokee Society, 1540–1866. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. ing the Reconquest as a ‘‘holy war,’’ a religious-military complex took shape in Spain. Freedom from Islamic rule Ramsey, William. 2001. ‘‘‘All and Singular the Slaves’: A was equated with Christian identity, and the religious Demographic Profile of Indian Slavery in South Carolina.’’ In Money, Trade and Power: The Evolution of South Carolina’s conversion of Muslims and Jews was a critical ideological Plantation Society, edited by Jack P. Greene, et al., 166–168. driving force behind the Reconquest. Using xenophobia Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. (fear of the Other) as grounds to conquer new lands for Rushforth, Brett. 2003. ‘‘‘A Little Flesh We Offer You’: The god and country, the Spanish carried these ideas to their Origins of Indian Slavery in New France.’’ William and Mary ‘‘New World’’ colonizations, beginning with Christopher Quarterly 60 (4): 777–808. Columbus’s arrival in 1492. Standwood, Owen. 2006. ‘‘Captives and Slaves: Indian Labor, The arrival of the Spanish in Mexico in 1519 marked Cultural Conversion, and the Plantation Revolution in the end of indigenous control over the region and the Virginia.’’ Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 114 collapse of the Aztec empire. Those indigenous peoples (4): 434–463. not killed by the sword were subjected to a wealth of 166 ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RACE AND RACISM Encyclopedia of Race and Racism, Vol2 – Finals/ 10/4/2007 13:09 Page 167 Indigenismo in Mexico foreign illnesses from smallpox to influenza, which reduced • African Slaves: Those brought from Africa to work the population of native peoples from an estimated 27.1 on coastal plantations or in the mines (Carmack million to as few as 1.2 million shortly after Spanish arrival 1996, pp. 172–174). (Carmack 1996, p. 128). In 1552, the Dominican priest Bartolome´ de las Casas (1474–1566) related the devasta- The caste status of Indians and African slaves varied tion that followed the arrival of the encomenderos, Spanish from one region to another. Frequently, an Indian death arrivals who earned land grants that included economic and from excessive labor was of no concern to encomenderos, political control over indigenous populations. Upon yet the loss of a slave meant a loss of paid property. This returning to Spain, Las Casas wrote about Spanish brutality justified, at times, the higher status of slaves over Indians. under the encomenderos and about his doubts that the As can be seen from the categories above, even though indigenous populations would ever truly be Christianized both criollos and peninsulares had the same skin color, they or fully integrated into Hispanic society. were separate castes. A constant struggle between peninsu- lares and their lesser criollo elites led to the eventual uprising Indigenismo is ‘‘public policy and institutions that of criollos against the peninsulares, contributing to Mexican address the educational, economic, health, and social needs independence from Spain in 1810. The Indians were a of the Indian population, with the underlying goal of assim- prominent part of the uprising because of their resistance ilating Indians into the mainstream culture’’ (Carmack to colonial taxation of obrajes and their objection to dom- 1996, p. 478). On the surface such policies appear beneficial inant views of the indigenous populations as ‘‘passive, to the well-being of the colonial empire, yet they also served dependent, docile, stupid, incapable of higher civilization, to further marginalize the indigenous peoples into resettled lacking in emotions and sensitivity, impervious to pain and communities known as congregaciones (or reducciones). suffering, [and] unable to improve their miserable condi- These resettlements were close to towns where labor pools tions of living’’ (Stavenhagen 1998, p. 16). (obrajes) could come from the native communities to aid The prevailing attitude at this time was that the indig- public work projects that developed the internal infrastruc- enous people needed to be ‘‘cared for’’ by missionaries. ture of the towns (municipios), yet they did little for the rural During this time, religious confraternities (cofrad´ıas) were countryside. Where indigenous labor was not accessible, formed by the missionaries, allowing indigenous peoples such as along the coast, African slaves were imported. In some degree of religious self-control over the practice of the ideal, indigenismo would bring the indigenous people Christian ceremonies. This led to religious syncretism, or a onto an equal footing with their European colonizers. It blending of traditional native beliefs with those of Chris- would, in essence, ‘‘civilize’’ them. Colonization, however, tianity. In the minds of rural friars, the Indians’ inherent had quite the opposite effect. Chief among the bad conse- inferiorities kept them low on the caste scale and out of quences of this process was the imposition of a caste system clergy positions. The derogatory nature of the word indio based on a series of status rankings. This became known as was created through the caste system and resulted in the doctrine of limpieza de sangre (purity of blood). increasing levels of legal discrimination. The missionaries Limpieza de sangre policies brought day-to-day real- viewed the caste system as a way of interacting with the ity to the caste situation in Mesoamerica. It was originally Indians in similar fashion as they had interacted with the dictated in Spain to allow only those of ‘‘demonstratable uneducated peasantry of Europe. Christian stock’’ to be allowed to attain noble status or to This marginalization of the native peoples was met hold public office. The extension