ENGLISH

The New Latin American Mission History (Latin American Studies)

By Robert H. Jackson , Erick D. Langer

Book information

Publisher
University of Nebraska Press
Year
1995
ISBN
0803279531, 9780803279537, 0803229119
LCC
BV2831 .N47 1995
Open Library ID
OL1116953M
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
54 MB (56676947 bytes)
Series
Latin American Studies Series
Pages
212\155
Topic
History
Time added
2011-06-04 13:46:07

Description

The subject of missions—formal efforts at religious conversion of native peoples of the Americas by colonizing powers—is one that renders the modern student a bit uncomfortable. Where the mission enterprise was actuated by true belief it strikes the modern sensibility as fanaticism; where it sprang from territorial or economic motives it seems the rankest sort of hypocrisy. That both elements—greed and real faith—were usually present at the same time is bewildering. In this book seven scholars attempt to create a “new” mission history that deals honestly with the actions and philosophic motivations of the missionaries, both as individuals and organizations and as agents of secular powers, and with the experiences and reactions of the indigenous peoples, including their strategies of accommodation, co-optation, and resistance. The new mission historians examine cases from throughout the hemisphere—from the Andes to northern Mexico to California—in an effort to find patterns in the contact between the European missionaries and the various societies they encountered.

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