18th Century Spanish America and Race

18th Century Spanish America and Race Assess the role of the State of Spanish America in the formation of ideas about human differences prior to the 18th century. The formation of ideas about human difference has been contingent upon both fluid and persistent socio-political, historical and economic forces since globalisation arguably began with the age of discovery in the 1400’s, arguably spear-headed by the Spanish empire. This is perhaps most perceptible in the key signifiers of human social distinction. Concepts such as ‘race’ and ‘ethnicity’ appear to be static, objective human categorisations; yet, when subjected to a process of historical and geo-political scrutiny, each proves to be a subjective and poignant signifier, even a product of a process of social and historical construction and part of the production of knowledge. [1] The historical phenomenon of the Spanish State serves as an exemplar to demonstrate a convergence of ideological paradigms which shaped notions of human difference, underscoring this central contention that ideas of human difference are generated within a specific historical milieu, often involving the confrontation of two or more ethno-cultural groups. It is crucial to acknowledge that Spain’s dominance of Africa from the 15 th century and parallel conquest of Latin America was enacted with the conscious and unconscious appropriation of Eurocentric ideals which emphasised European supremacy and assumed European cultural, theological and economic superiority over Amerindians. The seeds of such national superiority have been traced to Biblical delineations of difference, [2] with its demarcation of blessed and cursed progeny, reinforced historically by medieval theological thought which associated blackness with the devil and sin, while whiteness was aligned with purity and righteousness. The widely accepted European medieval theory of ‘monogenism’, derived from the Biblical teaching of a common ancestry and fam ily tree concept of origins, gave impetus to the Spanish State’s self identity. [3] This widely accepted view within medieval Europe has been largely discredited in more recent centuries, dismissing the notion of a common human genesis. [4] The Iberian Peninsula had left a potent legacy and precedent at the conclusion of the medieval period, with Spain’s stark delineation and unyielding destruction of human difference. The pronounced ethnic diversity on the peninsula in the form of Jewish and Muslim migrants from throughout Europe, the Middle East and Northern Africa, exacted a Spanish definition which underlined difference rather than similarity, and in fixating upon difference, brought the reflex action of the decimation of such diversity, through a systematic, historic and prolonged practice of massacre, segregation, conversion, inquisition and expulsion. [5] Such unenlightened, barbaric and medieval practices, one may argue, left their mark on the Spanish psyche, readily appropriated by the American Spanish state, as it imported and imposed its imperialistic, paternalistic and sanctimonious practices, upon a rich diversity of Amerindian ethnic societies. This precursor to the Spanish American state illuminates the historical consciousness of the earlier Spanish rule in Europe, revealing the cultural hegemonic assumptions and practices the Spanish state appropriated from its 14 th and 15 th century European roots. [6] The early 20 th century pejorative branding of pre-eighteenth century Spain as the ‘black legend’ evokes â€Å"Spain’s colonial brutality in the Americas during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.† [7] Ironically, Spain drew condemnation from other European nations for such action, deemed to be an ignorant, superstitious and fanatical nation, incapable of entering modernity. [8] Spain’s European condemners had been equally culpable in sub-Saharan Africa, in stimulating the African sl ave trade. By casting Spain as the antithetical demon, England, France and northern Europe masked their own international sins in the process. This brief observation illustrates one process that shaped human ideas about human difference, namely, intra-cultural ignorance and an insular societal gaze which repeatedly reinforced the values, practices and beliefs of Spain’s own cultural epicentre, and in the process, defined other ethnicities by their differences and their otherness. Moreover, the Spanish American state constructed a false social hierarchy based upon religious assumptions which condemned humans living a more unencumbered and simple existence initially beyond the grasp of modern commerce and technological innovation.