NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/bit/listserv/history/5633

Internet Message Format | 1992-11-06 | 3.8 KB

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From: [e-mail] (Steve Creps)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.history
Subject: Spanish colonization history
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 5 Nov 92 21:51:42 GMT
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Organization: Indiana University
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   I saw this on clari.local.indiana.  Thought it might be of interest
here:

>From: [e-mail] (UPI)
>Newsgroups: clari.local.indiana
>Subject: Spanish colonization history may not be totally accurate
>Date: Sun, 1 Nov 92 21:20:53 PST
>
>    MUNCIE, Ind. -- Ancient writings reveal that much of the current
>literature and discussions about Christopher Columbus and the Spanish
>colonization of the New World may not be accurate, says a Ball State
>historian.
>    ``It's a myth that the Indians all died of smallpox and became
>slaves,'' said Abel Alves, assistant professor of history.
>    Alves spent much of his summer in Texas and Mexico studying Nahuatl,
>the language used by the Aztecs at the time Spanish conquistadors
>arrived.
>    ``I became interested in Nahuatl because I didn't think I was getting
>all sides of the historical accounts I was reading,'' he said.
>    In reading the Indians' accounts in their own language, Alves has
>gained new insights into the people the Spanish governed. Reading
>primary accounts has reinforced the idea that the Indians were not as
>downtrodden as some people believe. On the contrary, the Aztecs
>struggled to retain much of their culture.
>    Nahuatl, in official court documents, shows the Aztecs were not
>solely passive victims as some current scholars teach, Alves said.
>    In fact, documents show that some Indians became well integrated into
>Spanish colonial society. Some who had been nobility before the arrival
>stayed in power, acting as intermediaries between Spanish authority and
>the general Indian population.
>    ``They collected tribute just as the Spanish did,'' he said.
>    Alves dismisses the notion that the Spanish were genocidal and that
>they planned to eliminate the entire race of Indians.
>    ``Many Spaniards did everything in their power to keep the Indians
>alive,'' he said. The Spanish wanted to convert the Indians to
>Christianity and use their labor, so killing the natives made no sense,
>he said.
>    Nahuatl had been spoken for countless generations before the Spanish
>arrived but the written form developed during the colonial period.
>Spaniards and Indians used the Roman alphabet to transcribe the sounds.
>    The written language came out of necessity when the Indians took
>grievances into courts. The language was officially recognized in the
>colonial Spanish courts.
>    Adjusting to two languages was not difficult for the Spanish, who
>were used to a multilinguistic society, Alves said. At home, on the
>Iberian peninsula, different variations of Spanish were spoken, in
>addition to Arabic and Basque.
>    Today, Nahuatl is fast becoming a dead language, spoken by only about
>one million people, Alves said. He believes it will soon pass from
>everyday usage altogether and wants to preserve it as much as possible.
>    ``It has become an elitist language used by local political bosses,''
>he said. ``Local women don't want to learn it because they don't want to
>be isolated from social and political interaction like their
>grandmothers,'' he said.
>    Alves' opportunity to study the language was the result of a National
>Endowment for the Humanities summer institute. He spent three weeks each
>at the University of Texas at Austin and at the Universidad de las
>Amricas in Cholula, Mexico.

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Steve Creps, Indiana University
[e-mail]