Question:
- Both Columbus and Guamán Poma are writing for a specific audience: the Spanish crown. How does this fact shape their texts? In what ways do they show they are aware of this audience?
- Guamán Poma’s book combines images with writing. What is the effect of this interplay of different media or forms of representation?
Answer:
- Both texts are directed to an audience that is in power. People of power who are going to want explanations for what has been done and why such actions needed to be taken. I think in both texts they are both trying to convince themselves and other around them of validity of what they did to these indigenous communities to these regions. Such as for Guman Poma, he is an interconnected to both sides. He is from the elites of the Incas but he is saving his own skin by being the Ali to the Spanish. I think he is attempting to make it seem like the Incas were in the wrong in the situation to show to his allies that he is trustworthy and an asset to them. However, I also think he is doing this to save his soul. These are his people, yes he may be helping the other side but it is very likely that he feels some form of pain towards the incas.
- For Guaman poma he was raised and taught on the art of speech and storytelling, drawings of what these stories were. The Incas never wrote anything down, that was not their way of life. Therefore, when guaman poma uses both writings and drawing in his transcripts, this is a direct nod to his Inca heritage. That regardless if he is physically standing with the Spaniards, he still had a deeply rooted connection to the Incas, whether he realized it or not. The idea of writing and images gives us as the reader a connection between the world of the colonizer and the indigenous communities being uprooted. Making things easier to comprehend
