Painting Indigenous Histories in Colonial Mexico

This seminar considers the ways in which indigenous histories and cultures were represented in manuscripts made by indigenous and missionary artists/authors of colonial Mexico. Part of our corpus will include manuscripts held in the John Carter Brown Library. Of particular importance to our inquiry will be definitions of writing and literacy; configurations of space and time; modes of recounting the past; representations of indigenous identities, the evolution and invention of pictorial forms; and the role of pictures in juridical contexts. The course will culminate with the creation of an online exhibition featuring books and manuscripts from the JCB’s collection.