Themes of Indigenous Acculturation in Northwest Mexico Item Type Book; text Authors Hinton, Thomas B. Publisher University of Arizona Press (Tucson, AZ) Rights Copyright © Arizona Board of Regents Download date 10/10/2021 19:13:34 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/615819 ANTHROPOLOGICAL PAPERS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA NUMBER 38 THEMES OF INDIGENOUS ACCULTURATION IN NORTHWEST MEXICO THOMAS B. HINTON and PHIL C. WEIGAND editors Contributors N. Ross Crumrine John Hobgood Timothy Dunnigan J. Alden Mason William B. Griffen Salomon Nahmad Sitton Thomas B. Hinton Carroll L. Riley Phil C. Weigand THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA PRESS TUCSON, ARIZONA 1981 ............ Papago U NIT E D ,------ .. "'---- -----r -- \ \ o 'r-----~ CHIHUA ~-.....---------='l I ~ Opata ~ ~ "'9 -----------7~ --- __ ~----...... o Warihto '\ ~~ I Tarahumara \- F-tJerte • U'c;., \ -----------------~~ ~ . Northern \Tepehuan -----------------~~ - " -PACIFIC----OCEAN------l .J:: -(5 c: kilometers 200 300 I I I o 100 200 300 S TAT E S NORTHERN MEXICO Showing Location of Indian Groups '" Treated in HUA \ Text I I \ Conchos (extinct) ~o'? ~rv , (} ""./ \ f '" \ / / \. \ COAHUILA , .......... \ , \ , '-)' '~ \. \. ------- ,\, ..r-,--"-.--,,~- ,_ NUEVO I r-- / '> , /' ( ,--:f.-, r- - __ I "-' ~ I • r DURANGO -..j ~ 'l.\ ~ LEON ,-i , '""/.. C ',. '\ 0 ;--_-1 / '\ / • 0' " ( 0 ..... < ZACATECAS , / .-J '\ ,<>'<9 ~ / '-~ , I'" /) \.: -.{. TAMAULIPAS ,,- _ Southern 0 / ( SAN ' " Tepehuan ( '\ ,JMexicanero " • --...l- 1---- Li.. - , \ I " -; 0 \ ../ ~ LU I S \ - 1_ '-----\ %.t- cora; --.J~, ~ ,) 7 ,r ."'- .: , ---- ~ (' ~ = . )7...<\ Huichol /"' I I y':' ./ POTOS I t' L.- IZ\ ,~ • Tepecano - '- ) ~ ---->r' ~~ { I Y-~ / '-"--"\ ;. ( 1J ~,-----=1 ~~,)' ) AGUASCALIENT-ES '1 \J \ r2 ")1o~ \. :x. ~ _5.~ I' \ \~'\o r- ~ ~of - .:/ -- I ~ r----- ../' ) <!' 5 n' ' \V A../'I /:" .. - ~ a (~~V ( ~v I ~~o 4" , \ .----"-V J A LIS CO ., G0~ ~ -::0~ .. .....-' \\)tr>- ,,, i ' / \ 0: I Y'- l/, \ Some images in this book have been redacted due to sensitive content. In Memory of Thomas B. Hinton CONTENTS PREFACE ix 5. Adaptive Strategies of Peasant Indians in a Biethnic Mexican Community: 1. Cultural Visibility and the Cora A Study of Mountain Pima Assimilation Thomas B. Hinton Timothy Dunnigan 36 2. Some Considerations of the Indirect and Controlled Acculturation in the 6. Some Problems in the Analysis of the Native Cora-Huichol Area Indian Population of Northern Nueva Vizcaya Salomon Nahmad Sitton 4 During the Spanish Colonial Period William B. Grfffen 50 3. Differential Acculturation Among the Huichol Indians 7. Tepusilam and Chul: A Comparison Phil C. Weigand 9 of Mexicanero and Tepehuan Mythology John Hobgood and Carroll L. Riley 54 4. The Mayo of Southern Sonora: Socio- economic Assimilation and Ritual-symbolic 8. The Ceremonialism of the Tepecan Indians Syncretism-Split Acculturation of Azqueltan, Jalisco N. Ross Crumrine 22 J. Alden Mason 62 FIGURES Frontispiece 4.7 A typical Mayo home. 29 Map of Northern Mexico showing the 4.8 Mayo and mestizo children breaking a pinata location of Indian groups treated in the text. ii&iii at a school Christmas party. 30 3. I Map showing the limits of the Huichol 4.9 The Holy Cross fiesteros on Easter Sunday in Nayarit and Jalisco, Mexico. 10 in Banari. 32 3.2 Huichol and mestizo children in 4.10 A Banari Chapakoba (Parisero). 33 San Sebastian. 15 4.11 A Banari Chapakoba. 33 3.3 Three Huichol sisters with their new radio, 5. 1 Distribution of the Mountain Branch of the San Sebastian. 16 Lower Pima, 1967. 37 3.4 Mestizo merchant men selling their wares in San Sebastian. 18 5.2 Sketch map of Maycoba, Sonora, 1967. 38 3.5 Two Huichol young men in traditional dress 5.3 Sketch map of Yecora, Sonora, but with mestizo hats, San Sebastian. 19 showing locations of Pima dwellings, 1967. 43 4.1 Cross above the spot where San Juan jumped 5.4 Sketch map of La Tijera into the Mayo River. 23 Sawmill,1967. 46 4.2 Area where San Juan jumped into the 5.5 Sketch map of Las Cuevitas Sawmill, 1967. 46 Mayo River. 24 7.1 Map showing Tlaxcallan, Southern Tepehuan, 4.3 Cross where the Saints' images were burned. 25 and Mexicanero settlements in northern Mexico. 55 4.4 The altar of the Banari Mayo church. 26 8.1 Preliminary map of San Lorenzo de Azqueltan, 4.5 A Mayo church in the upper Mayo River Valley. 27 1971. 63 4.6 Thorn forest in the upper Mayo Valley. 28 8.2 Funeral in Azqueltan. 70 [ vii] PREFACE The extensive culture change experienced by the Uto­ and large, there have been many surveys, but few in­ Aztecan speaking peoples of northern Mexico is the subject depth, detailed studies of specific aspects of Indian life in of this volume. The papers, like the contributors, represent northern Mexico. a variety of interests in cultural anthropology. All, however, The first anthropologists who became interested in north­ deal with closely related peoples and their responses to ern Mexico were basically explorers hoping to find links contact with Europeans that began nearly four and a half between the southwestern United States and Middle centuries ago. America, or, like the German scholar Preuss, were looking This volume had its inception in a symposium on culture for survivals of ancient Mexican religions. The best known change in northern Mexico which took place at the 1970 of the explorers was the pioneer Carl Lumholtz, who visited meetings of the American Anthropological Association. and mapped the Indian groups of the Sierra Madre region in Subsequent compilation of the papers and development of the 1890s. Other pioneers such as Hrdlicka, Bandelier, and the book have been understandably impeded by the un­ McGee were active in limited areas. Of these scholars only timely and unfortunate death of Tom Hinton in 1976. I am Preuss and Lumholtz produced in-depth studies, the former positive that I speak for all the contributing authors when working with Cora religion and linguistics, and the latter I dedicate these essays to his memory. with Huichol symbolism. Many discussions of northern Mexican ethnography state The area saw few anthropologists during the 1910-1917 that the area is a blank spot on the anthropological map, and Revolution. About 1930, cultural geographers Carl Sauer that the native cultures, with a few exceptions, have all but and Donald Brand and anthropologist Ralph Beals redis­ disappeared. While northwest Mexico may still be poorly covered the area, and their publications inspired a number represented in ethnographic publications if compared with a of studies. Most of these were concerned with the cultural region of massive anthropological literature such as the history of the north Mexican tribes. Interest in possible links American Southwest or Mesoamerica, there is now a rather between the American Southwest and central Mexico was extensive published literature on the surviving Indians of still strong. This period produced several ethnographies the region and still more information available in unpub­ such as Bennett and Zingg's study of the Tarahumara, lished sources. Beals's work among the Cahita, and Zingg's study of Observations of the native peoples of the Mexican the Huichol. Northwest began in Spanish colonial times with the explor­ Since the Second World War and especially since 1950, ers and the missionary priests who followed them. These research has accelerated in the area so that nearly every early travelers left vast amounts of documentary material, group has been studied to some degree. We can point to the much of it still to be studied in the archives of Mexico and work of Spicer (Yaqui); Kennedy (Tarahumara); Pennington Spain. Writers such as Perez de Rivas, Arias de Saavedra, (Tarahumara and Tepehuan); Benitez (Huichol and Cora); Tello, Mange, and scores of others give us an historic Grimes, Fabila, Negrin, Furst, Myerhoff, Anguiano, and baseline for this area. Many of these sources are confused, Muller (Huichol); Shadow (Tepecan); and the work of each fragmentary, and display the expected bias of the writers, of the present authors. All these investigators have covered but they have furnished us with the time depth necessary for aspects of social anthropology and thus we can see a signifi­ culture change research. From some of the colonial ac­ cant and growing literature for most of this area. There is counts the relationship between the earlier peoples and their still a great need for detailed in-depth studies on social present-day descendants is clear and distinct; in others, organization, languages, ethnobotany, and even aspects of similarities are elusive or seemingly nonexistent. material culture. Most workers in this region are impressed Modem anthropological investigation began in this re­ by the vast amount of data that could still be collected from gion in the 1880s, and can be examined in three periods, each of these groups, and most of us realize we have only each roughly representing the interest of the times. Re­ scratched the surface of this rich anthropological province. search has always been hampered by the sheer physical Much of the information recovered in the area still re­ isolation of the area, by periods of political unrest in the mains to be published. More sophisticated modem tech­ years of the revolutions, and by the generally mistaken idea niques for gathering and recording research material are that native cultures in these regions were nearly extinct. being employed. We now have considerable ethnographic Scholars working in this area have been characterized by film footage from every group, and groups such as the a broad range of interests in anthropology. This has both Huichol and Tarahumara have been the subjects of a great advanced and hampered an understanding of the area. By deal of both anthropological and popular photography. ix x Preface All the authors of this volume are anthropologists who Salomon Nahmad's paper discusses the culture change have done fieldwork in northern Mexico. All are academics taking place in the Cora-Huichol area in light of increased except Dr.