Author: jshoudy

When reading Guaman Poma, I was struck – which I have been often, it seems – by his theory and justification for a new, or different, form of Spanish colonialism. His ‘Catholicization’ of the Andean Indigenous cosmic vision was a very (morbidly) interesting method of colonial imposition. I was expecting a more ‘direct’ form of erasure, such as the forcing of Catholic belief onto the Indigenous population while also regulating, banning, or destroying their unique worldviews. This is only sort of the case; instead, Guaman Poma sort of canonized the Indigenous worldview (broadly speaking) within a Biblical framework. By including them as descendants of Noah, for example, he doesn’t actually alienate the Indigenous and their beliefs from the Catholic world. He basically just calls them confused, misguided, idolatrous, but still somewhat admirable as worshippers of ‘the divine’. This is a Catholic generalization; assuming that the Indigenous Andeans considered their worship practices ‘otherworldly’ could be far from correct. Also, this somewhat sympathetic depiction of Indigenous Andeans is still an oppressive, imposing account that justifies colonialism. In other words, different means to the same end. Still, the lack of at least direct ‘otherization’ regarding the Indigenous Andeans felt rather unique. Further, I’m really curious as to how Indigenous forms of Catholicism have developed in the Andes. Are there Indigenous worldviews imbued within Catholic beliefs? How do people who would identify with Andean Indigeneity feel about Catholicism now? Granted, being ‘curious’ about the effects of a culture’s worldviews being imposed upon and eroded by colonialism feels insensitive. Curious, but deeply saddened, feels like a much better way to say it. In fact, much of the reading and experience we’ve done, while so fascinating, makes me really sad. Grace brought up a very validating point a few hours ago about how sad this Guaman Poma reading is. Leaving his positionality out of the question, he is sort of writing on behalf of Indigenous Andeans, defending their capability of converting while critiquing the cruelty of Spanish colonialism. Cruelly, the reality of what the Spanish were doing to Indigenous Andeans was far different than the plan Guaman Poma so painstakingly laid out. As has been mentioned, his writing never reached the Crown. It is worth wondering if he would have had any sway in that sphere, but I very much doubt it. Much of Guaman Poma’s feelings toward the Indigenous Andeans, while deeply contaminated with Catholicism, are informed (apparently) by his lived experience. Obviously, this is not the case regarding the members of Spanish royalty. I forgot which Spanish king it was that never visited ‘the Indies’; or maybe it was none of them? What a bunch of evil fuckers.

In Stern’s description of how the indigenous peoples of the Andes adapted economically to Spanish colonialism, I found it very interesting how a small portion of that indigenous population managed to accumulate property, gain wealth, and explore business endeavors in an economic environment that was stacked entirely against them. At first, I was taken aback by this information; why would the Spanish colonizers have allowed any form of freedom or movement within a population that they had so harshly subjugated? It seemed counter-intuitive to their primary goal of dominating the land and, in turn, destroying indigenous culture. However, I took a moment to consider what it meant for the broader indigenous community of the Andes to have certain members absorbed into the earliest days of capitalism. In fact, it was indeed destroying the indigenous population as effectively as any form of conquest could. As Stern notes, the imposition of a capitalist system by the Spanish completely uprooted the economic relations and strategies employed by the indigenous peoples. At the forefront of this uprooting was the fanatical individualism that the capitalist system perpetuates. While I do not claim to comprehensively understand the economic strategies of indigenous Andeans, it has been noted on multiple occasions that they adopted a far more community-oriented approach. Jon has mentioned this himself multiple times regarding us paying him back; reciprocal economic relations that rely completely on other community members. So when certain indigenous people began to participate in the capitalist economy (beyond solely being laborers, who of course did not get to accumulate anything), the community-oriented forms of trade and accumulation became obsolete. This realization ties back to one of my earlier blog posts, where I mentioned my dismay at the vicious intent within every single aspect of colonialism. I think the reason I have found these somewhat trivial realizations (colonialism is obviously evil) worth noting is that I’ve been spending quite a bit of time considering how we can preserve, make room for, and promote indigeneity within the current economic, political, and social climate. Is it even possible to reconcile indigeneity with this framework? Even that question feels convoluted, as the label ‘indigeneity’ only exists because of that colonial other. Is it perhaps too late? Has too much damage already been done? These are rather heavy questions that I imagine may be partially answered as we dive further into the course. Lastly, I don’t wish to convey a solely tragic and depressing view of contemporary indigenous life; indigenous peoples all over the world experience joy, love, and peace. I suppose I’m grasping at an idyllic view of indigeneity; that life in indigenous cultures has been inherently worse since contact, and the best way to preserve indigeneity is to somehow re-create conditions of pre-contact life.  As I’m typing that out, I’m not remotely sure if there’s any truth to that idea at all. Perhaps, given my positionality as a white dude, this is all just me being a part of the problem as well? It’s very complex!!

Since reading The Lettered City, Rama’s notion of a rigid order within the colonizer’s city planning has been stuck in my mind. So much so, that, in this past week’s numerous expeditions throughout Lima, I have been attempting to find this alleged ‘orderliness’; as of now I have found everything but. In a rather wonderful way, this city is the most chaotic and disorderly place I have seen in my life. The foot traffic is all over the place; vehicles swerve and gap one another while pigeons fly to and fro. The streets are filled with vendors of food, art, and massages; their stands are plastered against a background of rising towers that look incredibly out of place in and of themselves. This may be solely my interpretation, but the whole scene offers no semblance of ‘order’, and I love it. I believe this irony serves, at the very least, as some form of a ‘fuck you’ to the colonial powers that attempted to mold a perfectly orderly Lima. Indeed, I wondered whether this disorderliness that Lima has adopted was due to some failure by the Spanish or simply a symptom of something like a massive increase in population, or pressure over the centuries to grow in ways that reflected growth around the world. However, as I type this, I’ve realized that this question is not a simple “either/or” because Lima responding the pressures of Western modernity in the first place is rooted within its colonial past. Instead, I think the answer relates to our first discussion about the inability of a simulation to create something ‘real’. I believe that the Spanish failed in their goal of an orderly utopia due to the inevitability of reality. Of course, this questions whether Lima’s disorderliness is a ‘fuck you’, but I am choosing to interpret it as so because it makes me happy. Further,

When reading the assigned excerpt from The Lettered City, I was intrigued by the notion of ‘order’ that characterized the urban planning of Spanish (and Portuguese) colonialism in South America. I think this was primarily due to that notion being entirely new to me; the idea that the planning of cities is not only highly variable (that being ‘organic’ or ‘orderly’), but that the different logics of urban planning can be rooted within colonial and capitalist goals. While this may have been far obvious to others, my ignorance of that idea certainly made for a pleasant surprise during my reading. I was especially drawn to the more conceptual explanations of what it means to plan something out in an ‘orderly’ manner. More specifically, how this goal implies maintaining a norm as time passes, thereby ignoring external influences of inevitable change. In the context of Spanish colonialism, this of course implicates the countless indigenous groups that would become marginalized by a city’s (Lima, for example) rigid order. It is morbidly interesting to me how truly methodical colonial tactics are; no strategy employed by colonizers was not rooted in the goal of destroying the ‘other’. Another interesting point from The Lettered City is the importance of letters, words, and writing in how colonial, and later structural, inequalities were enforced. It took centuries for the non-elite to gain access to reading and writing, which of course allowed for the elite class to easily consolidate power and subjugate the indigenous population as well as the African population brought over for slave labor. I really enjoyed the way this text emphasized the importance of writing as a part of colonialism rather than the more prominent militaristic and economic tactics, though they all are of course intertwined with one another. On another note, I was taken aback by how large the African population was in Lima. I supposed I never considered that Africans were used for labor all throughout the Americas, even in the far-reaching western part of South America. To finish up, I found the text to be an interesting but difficult read; it was full of jargon. Regarding the assigned sections of The Lima Reader, I found the excerpts of colonial perspectives very interesting. I say ‘colonial perspectives’ because while there weren’t any indigenous perspectives of the Spanish and indigenous interaction, there were certainly some third-person descriptions of events. It was particularly intriguing to read the one story about a conversation between an Inkan and a Spaniard that was written under a pseudonym, which highlighted a method by which a form of Spanish propaganda was disseminated to further alienate and oppress the indigenous population.

Flight to Lima tomorrow…

As the realization that I am actually going to Peru sets in at last, I am beginning to switch my brain off of vacation mode; as should be evident from my last blog post (lol!), I have been leaning heavily into the time off. I want this blog post to serve as a sort of warm-up exercise for my brain, which I need terribly, while also allowing me to put my excited, nervous, and other forms of thought to paper. After reading one of Jon’s earlier blog posts (it may have been his first?), the notion of tourism – and we students as those tourists – has been stuck in my head. I like to think that I have always been wary of my role as a tourist when visiting different places, but I imagine that this wariness certainly has its limits. I am terribly excited to learn about the concept of tourism as it relates Indigeneity and colonialism. As Jon has alluded to, this will certainly have implications for the tourism we as a group will be conducting, ones which may be hard to hear. However, I feel this will be learning that I have to understand to pursue both my personal and academic goals later in life. Is it possible to reconcile wanting to travel and experience new places while also respecting the land and culture of different groups throughout the world? I hope to find at least a partial answer to this question through my learning in Peru.

My name is Julian Shoudy, and I’m entering my third year at UBC. I’m actually going to declare my major right after I upload this blog post, which is super exciting; if all goes well, it will be socio-cultural anthropology. I love to meet new people, be out and about, and drink beer in the sun. Most importantly, I love to learn and I expect to do a lot of that on this trip. I hope that the balance of studying hard and getting to experience Peru will work well for me, and I think that the altitude in some of the places we’ll stay will destroy me. I am so excited to see you all and get to know you better!