acase@tulane.edu / This research explores late colonial Guatemalan social relations through the lens of incestuous crime. The topic of incest in New Spain has received some scholarly attention (e.g. Margadant 2001, Jaffary 2007, Penyak 2016). For colonial Central America, incest cases have surfaced in studies on sexual violence (Rodríguez-Sáenz 2005 and Komisaruk 2008). Still, research on incest in both its consensual and non-consensual forms is missing for colonial Guatemala, and this investigation fills the gap. The study is based on data collected from criminal records produced in the secular colonial courts. Feminist and postmodern critiques both within and beyond anthropology have shaped its analysis. Chapter 2 begins with a description of the system of socioracial classification and the culture of honor in Spanish America. This is followed by a discussion of how patriarchal authority could lead to violence against female kin. Chapter 3 charts the evolving definition of incest in canon law and shows its impact on Spanish civil law. It concludes with an examination of the penalties associated with Guatemalan incest trials and their intersections with race, gender, and marital status. Chapter 4 presents the types of incest typically brought to trial and the discourse generated by incest in its various manifestations. It also considers how the nature of kin ties influenced the interpretation of evidence and expectations of how individuals would behave in the courtroom. Chapter 5 explores the malleable nature of colonial Guatemalan kinship and the complications it could cause during incest trials. It then looks at how colonial Guatemalans used kinship in strategic ways. Chapter 6 focuses on how incestuous crime was associated with Indianness and the polarizing effect it would have had on race relations. Overall, this study of incestuous crime highlights how the realm of kinship served to reinforce hierarchies of race and gender. It reveals the subjective and relative nature of kin ties and the strategic actors behind them. It shows a dialectical process in which actors with different conceptions of relatedness and incest confronted one another and created the potential for cultural and legal change. / 1 / Sarah Saffa
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TULANE/oai:http://digitallibrary.tulane.edu/:tulane_78562 |
| Date | January 2018 |
| Contributors | Saffa, Sarah (author), Hill, Robert (Thesis advisor), School of Liberal Arts Anthropology (Degree granting institution) |
| Publisher | Tulane University |
| Source Sets | Tulane University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | electronic, 319 |
| Rights | No embargo, Copyright is in accordance with U.S. Copyright law. |
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