Until the early 1800’s, Spain created an empire that lasted around three hundred years and was considered “the most powerful country in Europe” (Mini Q). During the late 18th century, the Spanish colonies had an uncompromising social structure to which people were placed in different classes based on their heritage. The Creoles, people born in the colonies but of pure Spanish blood, lead the fight in the struggle for independence because of the economic and social conditions as well as the attempt to gain political power. The Creoles wanted to somehow get political power, but they were being rejected of it; however, they were gaining nobility. They owned the “largest and richest mines and haciendas” (Hook Exercise), but even with wealth, the Creoles “held few high-ranking jobs in the government” (Hook Exercise); hence, those jobs went to the peninsulares. They were also the “least oppressed” (Modern World History) of those who were born in the Latin America as well as the most educated, for they adopted the Enlightenment ideas. Also, when the monarchy collapsed, the Creoles wouldn’t let the “political vacuum to remain unfilled, their lives and …show more content…
The peninsulares were people who were born in Spain and migrated to the colonies which tended to be the wealthiest. Then came the Creoles (pure Spanish blood that were born in America), the mestizos (mixed with Spanish and Indian ancestry), the mulattos (mixed African and Spanish blood) and free blacks, the Indians, and at the bottom were the slaves (African descents). Also, the lower classes cause an uprising which frightened the Creoles because they feared that they would lose “property, control of the land, and their lives” (Modern World History), so they wanted to lead the fight for independence as well as support
For four hundred years Spain ruled over an immense and profitable global empire that included islands in the Caribbean, Americas, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. After the Napoleonic Wars (1808-1815) many of Spain’s colonies followed the US’s lead, fighting and winning their independence. These revolts, coupled with other nations chipping away at Spain’s interests, dwindled Spain’s former Empire. By 1860, only Cuba and Puerto Rico were what remained of Spain’s former Empire. Following the lead of other former Spanish colonies, Cuban fighters started their campaign for independence, known as the Ten year war (1868-1878). This war developed into a Cuban insurgency which fought a guerilla war against the Spanish occupation.2
Haiti is one of the most unusual countries in Latin America as it is the only French-speaking nation in the Caribbean as well as the first to receive its independence. Haiti’s most unique characteristic, however, is in regard to race. “The population of Haiti on the eve of the French Revolution was made up of over 90% black slaves, with whites numbering only about 40,000 out of a total population of 519,000” . This large disparity can be explained due to the fact that, at one time, Haiti was one of the wealthiest places in the world during French colonization. At the time of the French Revolution in 1789, the sugar production of Saint Dominique exceeded that of all the British West Indies, and on the eve of the revolution the colony accounted for more than one-third of the foreign commerce of France. “Saint-Domi...
Honour was a principle that members of colonial society protected fiercely but whether one’s bloodline automatically inherited respect was debatable. The diverse society of ten required the judicial system to settle when these interests collided. During the colonial period, the defining characteristic of Latin American society was its highly stratified society. The rights afforded to the different social classes differed greatly depending on which class they belong. Those with pure Spanish blood were the elites of the society. Beneath them on the social hierarchy lay the plebians, people with mixed racial backgrounds including creoles and mulattoes. Next were the “indios” (indigenous
This paper will be exploring the book The Vanguard of the Atlantic World by James Sanders. This book focuses upon the early 1800 to the 1900 and explores the development of South American political system as well expresses some issues that some Latino counties had with Europe and North America. Thus, Sanders focus is on how Latin America political system changes throughout this certain time and how does the surrounding countries have an effect as well on Latin political system. Therefore, the previous statement leads into some insight on what the thesis of the book is. Sanders thesis is, “Latin American’s believed they represented the future because they had adopted Republicanism and democracy while Europe was in the past dealing with monarchs
The Spanish rule had effectively started to take over in 1598 when a man by the name of Juan de Onante began his invasion on the indigenous people. Onante was able to set up the first Spanish colony which consisted of soldiers and women and children. The land that he invaded was inhabited by the Natives but when they had the first colony the Spanish began to segregate the natives into two groups the “Barbaros” and the “Pueblos”. The Spanish colonization had over 100 communities spreading over hundreds of miles. Although, they were lumped into ‘...
In chapter two, Menchaca discusses Spain's racial formation within Mexican society. After the conquest of Mexico, Spain began to control and implement their way of life within the indigenous communities of Mexico. Many ingenious tribes of Mexico adapted to the social, political, and economic changes brought by the Spanish. The Spanish had developed a new way of structuring society solely based on race. This new structure was a caste system that divided people into different racial categories. For example, Peninsulares (pure blood Spanish) were on the top of the class structure, then criollos (Spanish born in the New World), Mestizos (Mixture of Indigenous and Spanish), Castizo (Mixture of Spanish and Mestizo), African slaves, Indians (Indigenous
Early in the nineteenth century rebellion against European authority broke out in Latin America. First, slaves on the island of Haiti revolted against their French masters. Led by former slave Toussaint L'Overture the Haitians defeated France making Haiti the...
The vitality of New Spain in the eighteenth century is best explained by the awaking of the Mexican identity, especially among creoles. During the eighteenth century New Spain and its now native born citizens came to life so to speak. The creoles would come to embrace and treasure the fact that the culture of New Spain and completely transformed from traditional Spanish culture. The first immediately noticeable difference was the language, the loss of the Castilian lisp and being enriched by Indian words and diminutives. Basically the whole cultural identity would be transformed from diet, dress, literature, art and music. The Creoles would shun the older customs and would identify as Americanos or Mexicanos and not as Spaniards. Their demand
Creoles were native born whites that had grown resentful of the Peninsulars in the 1700s. The Creoles and Peninsulars had a power struggle in the caste system in the Spanish American society. The Creoles owned the land and most of the population lived under the landowners. The Creoles wanted to keep the people of mixed race down, and opposed successful mixed race people climbing the social ladder and gaining any power. These people had many reasons to rebel against the Creoles, one of which was due to the fact that the Creoles had little interest in changing a social hierarchy they dominated. Fast-forwarding to Mexico in the 1800s, the Creoles dominated the town council of Mexico City, known as a cabildo. The cabildo, run by the Creoles, saw
The Caribbean, a region usually exoticized and depicted as tropical and similar in its environmental ways, cannot be characterized as homogenous. Each individual island has their own diverse historical background when it comes to how and when they became colonized, which European country had the strongest influence on them, and the unique individual cultures that were integrated into one. The three authors Sidney W. Mintz, Antonio Benitez-Rojo, and Michelle Cliff, all and address the problem of the Caribbean’s identity. They each discuss how the Caribbean’s diverse culture was created and molded by each individual island’s history, how its society was molded by the development of plantations, how the Caribbean dealt with the issue of slavery, and how miscegenation and the integration of cultures, as a result of slavery, contributed to the region’s individualism in regards to culture. Colonialism and acculturation and their impacts on the Caribbean islands were also important issues discussed by Mintz, Benitez-Rojo, and Cliff.
Jesus Colon, in “How to Know the Puerto Ricans,” makes a statement that I believe explains and articulates the effect centuries of exploitation has had on Puerto Rico, and on the identity of Puerto Ricans. He writes, “So when you come to knock at the door of a Puerto Rican home you will be encountered by this feeling in the Puerto Rican-sometimes unconscious in himself-of having been taken for a ride for centuries.”(Santiago, 71) This assertion is appropriate and logical in the sense that Puerto Rico was invaded, ruled, and exploited by the Spaniards from 1508 until July 1898 when the Spanish flag was lowered and the United States began its invasion. With the exclusion of the aristocrats, who were either directly from Spain or criollos , there was complete oppression in Puerto Rico during the time it was a Spanish colony. The history of Puerto Rico under Spanish rule is useful in understanding the formation of Puerto Rican identity and in understanding some of the literature written by Puerto Ricans regarding issues of identity.
Star²ng with Christopher Columbus in 1492 (who was incidentally Italian), the Spanish were the dominant group of se±lers in the New World for over a century. Abundant natural resources, like silver, and Na²ve American labor provided Spain with immense wealth. With the excep²on of Brazil, the Spanish expanded throughout the Caribbean, Central and South America and even into the southern and western parts of today’s United States. However, because the sheer amount of wealth generated from the New World, other European countries eventually developed their own interests in se±lement. The English began some explora²on in the late 1500s, but their ³rst permanent se±lement was not un²l Jamestown in 1607. The English se±lers shared some characteris²cs as the Spanish: economic wealth and religiosity.
country’s history. In this essay I will out outline the themes of nationality within Spanish
Scholars have debated not only the nature of Iberian colonialism, but also the impact that independence had on the people of Latin America. Historian Jaime E. Rodriguez said that, “The emancipation of [Latin America] did not merely consist of separation from the mother country, as in the case of the United States. It also destroyed a vast and responsive social, political, and economic system that functioned well despite many imperfections.” I believe that when independence emerged in Latin America, it was a positive force. However, as time progressed, it indeed does cause conflict.
Spain’s colonization was marked by unprovoked brutality in the search for gold, thinly veiled by the claims of a desire for the ‘savages’ and ‘heathens’ of the land to convert to Catholicism. The conquistadors methods of, (as Ferdinand and Isabella put it.) “Discovering and subduing” the “islands and continent in the ocean” were harsh and inhumane. The Spanish didn’t see or treat the Indians as humans. They treated the Indian killings as a sport. They forced them to conform to the Spanish way of life, and they coerced them to the level of chattel. These methods of dehumanization carried over into the way that the English treated the Indians as well; paving the way for the enslavement of African Americans in the ‘land of the free, and home of