Drug Users

This chapter outlines some of the history and key attributes of ethnographies of drug users. Long before the invention of writing, human beings began noticing that other human beings behaved oddly when they consumed certain materials. In some cases, the observers imitated the consumption that they saw, and the behavior spread. Eventually, protoethnographers such as Herodotus and Bernardino de Sahagún wrote extensively about what they saw (and heard) about the consumption of drug plants and preparations among people outside their personal cultural experience. Until the fifth century before the common era (500 bce), however, only oral history stories described what people from distinct cultural backgrounds consumed to the point of intoxication. Formal ethnography, as defined by the relatively young disciplines of anthropology and sociology, emerged just before the twentieth century, and it gradually proved its worth as a strategy for understanding human life in its highly varied cultural manifestations. As ethnography became an increasingly apt tool for the study of human cultural life, some ethnographers used it to advantage in comprehending practices of drug users in terms of political economic context, psychopharmacological impact, interpersonal relations, and health risk. Ethnography of drug use has become an indispensable component in scientific efforts to understand drug use, mitigate its impact, and prevent its spread.

The Renaissance Reception of Nahua Paideia in the Writings of Bernardino de Sahagún: An Aesthetic Approach to Religion

In this article, I propose that books I–VI of Bernardino Sahagún’s Códice florentino, which discuss the moral and religious philosophies of indigenous Mexicans, should be interpreted through the lens of Renaissance humanist linguistic and philosophical theories. I demonstrate that, utilizing Franciscan–Bonaventurean epistemology, Sahagún put forward a method of evangelizing that intended to separate “the good from the bad” in indigenous cultures. In an effort to defend my claim, I first lay out some of the problems surrounding the Códice florentino. Second, I describe the general theological and cosmological views held by the Aztecs, so that, third, I may develop the main principles of the philosophy of flor y canto (in xochitl in cuicatl). Against a political interpretation that is often defended by appealing to the traditional rituals performed in the Aztec empire, I contend that their philosophy should be interpreted from the perspective of Nahua religion and aesthetics. I also discuss Sahagún’s reception of Aztec philosophy in the Códice with a focus on his interest in the linguistic and empirical dimensions of Nahua religion.

Exclusive Monotheism and Sahagún’s Mission: The Problem of Universals in the First Book of the Florentine Codex

This article outlines the missionary methods of the Franciscan Bernardino de Sahagún, his interaction with Nahua communities in central Mexico, and the production of a text called the Florentine Codex. This article argues that the philosophical problem of universals, whether “common natures” existed and whether they existed across all cultures, influenced iconoclastic arguments about Nahua gods and idolatry. Focusing on the Florentine Codex Book 1 and its Appendix, containing a description of Nahua gods and their refutation, the article establishes how Sahagún and his team contended with the concept of universals as shaped by Nahua history and religion. This article presents the Florentine Codex Book 1 as a case study that points to larger patterns in the Christian religion, its need for mission, and its construal of true and false religion.

Las epidemias del México prehispánico: un breve recorrido histórico

La Historia nos provee de algunos elementos para conocer las epidemias que los pueblos mesoamericanos enfrentaron inclusive antes de la llegada de los conquistadores. El arribo de las tropas de Hernán Cortés y las batallas antes los mexicas no solo hicieron el encuentro de dos cuerpos militares, sino de ejércitos invisibles, pero aún más potentes, que se manifestaron como enfermedades con consecuencias desastrosas para las poblaciones indígenas. Los cronistas de aquella época narraron los sucesos y efectos de estas olas epidémicas. A través de la revisión de Códices como el Florentino, Telleriano-Remensis y De la Cruz-Badiano, así como del testimonio de uno de los actores de esos primeros tiempos de la conquista, Bernardino de Sahagún, podemos hacer un recuento de las principales pandemias sufridas por las poblaciones prehispánicas en un periodo que abarca de 1446 a 1576.

Tradução, Evangelização e Negociação Linguística: uma Exploração Interdisciplinar

A tradução da doutrina cristã para as línguas nativas americanas durante a época colonial espanhola apresenta importantes questionamentos para a tradutologia, os quais incitam a análise multi e interdisciplinar. No presente artigo, examinamos o estado da questão da linguística missionária, e do tratamento que foi dado ao encontro cultural que aconteceu entre indígenas nahuas e missionários na Nova Espanha durante o século XVI, desde a filosofia, para realizar uma análise de dois exemplos de tradução com fins de evangelização retirados dos Coloquios de 1524 do frei Bernardino de Sahagún (1986). Relacionamos alguns paralelismos entre o caso colonial e certas iniciativas atuais, e sublinhamos a pertinência de alguns conceitos da linguística, da tradutologia e da filosofia para analisar o problema da comunicação intercultural, assim como o fundamento político e cultural subjacente no caso da Nova Espanha. O tema leva-nos à seguinte pergunta: em que medida essas traduções, realizadas em conjunto por indígenas e missionários, foram um fator relevante de resistência cultural diante dos embates colonialistas de imposição religiosa?

Diagnóstico a partir de la propuesta de un museo interactivo en el museo de Fray Bernardino de Sahagún

El museo de “Fray Bernardino de Sahagún es un museo antropológico ubicado en el municipio de Tepeapulco, Hidalgo el cual puede progresar al transformarse en un museo interactivo para mejorar sus servicios que servirán para atraer turistas a la región que llena de riqueza cultural y natural. El objetivo fue analizar los procesos turísticos y el Patrimonio Cultural Material en el municipio para diseñar una propuesta para la creación de un museo interactivo en el museo de “Fray Bernardino de Sahagún. Para ello el estudio se realizó bajo un enfoque cualitativo con diseño fenomenológico con el fin de conocer las experiencias y opiniones de las personas. La propuesta del museo interactivo en el municipio de Tepeapulco Hidalgo es realmente viable, pero se debe tener en cuenta factores como el presupuesto, espacio y público al que está dirigido.

Writing the New World: The Politics of Natural History in the Early Spanish Empire

In Writing the New World, Mauro Caraccioli examines the natural history writings of early Spanish missionaries, using these texts to argue that colonial Latin America was fundamental in the development of modern political thought. Revealing their narrative context, religious ideals, and political implications, Caraccioli shows how these sixteenth-century works promoted a distinct genre of philosophical wonder in service of an emerging colonial social order. Caraccioli discusses narrative techniques employed by well-known figures such as Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo and Bartolomé de Las Casas as well as less-studied authors including Bernardino de Sahagún, Francisco Hernández, and José de Acosta. More than mere catalogues of the natural wonders of the New World, these writings advocate mining and molding untapped landscapes, detailing the possibilities for extracting not just resources from the land but also new moral values from indigenous communities. Analyzing the intersections between politics, science, and faith that surface in these accounts, Caraccioli shows how the portrayal of nature served the ends of imperial domination.Integrating the fields of political theory, environmental history, Latin American literature, and religious studies, this book showcases Spain’s role in the intellectual formation of modernity and Latin America’s place as the crucible for the Scientific Revolution. Its insights are also relevant to debates about the interplay between politics and environmental studies in the Global South today.

Rzecz z dziejów Nowej Hiszpanii como una reescritura polaca de la Historia general de las cosas de la Nueva España de Bernardino de Sahagún

El artículo está dedicado a una enciclopedia de la cultura nahua, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva España, del siglo XVI y una de sus ediciones polaca Rzecz z dziejów Nowej Hiszpanii. Księgi I, II i III (2007), editada por Kamila Baraniecka. Tradicionalmente, dicha enciclopedia es considerada como el resultado del trabajo de campo etnográfico efectuado por un fraile franciscano español, Bernardino de Sahagún, cuestión que se discute aquí ampliamente. Resulta que el polisistema polaco dispone de cuatro diferentes reescrituras-traducciones de fragmentos seleccionados de la enciclopedia, que se centran en distintos temas. No obstante, se presta una atención especial a la traducción hecha en base a un hipertexto español (Primeros memoriales) y un hipertexto inglés (himnos) que son unas versiones del “original” bilingüe. La edición de Baraniecka es analizada como la que tiene carácter científico y, aparte de centrarse en la religión azteca, se complementa con una serie de diversos paratextos, como una introducción, notas a pie de página y un glosario. This paper is devoted to an 16th century encyclopaedia of the Nahua culture, General History of the Things of New Spain, and one of its Polish editions Rzecz z dziejów Nowej Hiszpanii. Księgi I, II i III (2007) edited by Kamila Baraniecka. Traditionally, the encyclopaedia is considered as a result of the ethnographic fieldwork of a Spanish Franciscan friar, Bernardino de Sahagún, a question that is largely discussed here. It turns out that the Polish polysystem deals with four different rewritings-translations of selected fragments of the encyclopaedia, which are focused on different topics. Nevertheless, special attention is paid to the edition translated from Spanish (Primeros memoriales) and English (hymns) hypertexts of the “original” bilingual encyclopaedia. Baraniecka’s edition is analysed as a scientific one, focused on the Aztec religion, and completed with a series of various paratexts, such as an introduction, footnotes and a glossary.

Los historiadores mexicanos del siglo XIX y el surgimiento de la identidad nacional mexicana

The present article is trying to find and link the work of the 19th‑century Mexican historiography with the emergence of the national identity of the society of Mexico. Contextualizing this process, the paper recalls the main events of the political scene of a newly independent and sovereign country, also involved in a whole series of international conflicts. The purpose is to find, in the works of Teresa de Mier, Bustamante, Ramírez, Icazbalceta, Paso and Troncoso, Alemán, Orozco and Berra, those contributions that had a relevant impact on the vision of the historical past related to both the independence process and the pre‑Hispanic period, that is, Mesoamerican and colonial history. These contributions are perceived mainly in the rescue of the masterpiece of Fray Bernardino de Sahagún and the confrontation with the foundational narration of both the Creole culture and the indigenous culture that was formed after the conquest, i.e. the miraculous appearance of the Virgin from Guadalupe.