Spectacular wealth : the festivals of colonial South American mining towns / Lisa Voigt.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Voigt, Lisa (Associate professor), author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Festivals--Social aspects--South America.

Festivals.

Mining districts.

Ethnicity.

Manners and customs.

Festivals--Social aspects.

South America--History--To 1806.

South America.

History.

South America--Social life and customs.

South America--Ethnic identity.

Mining districts--South America.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

x, 225 pages ; 23 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Austin : University of Texas Press, 2016.

Summary:

Bridging print culture and performance, Spectacular Wealth draws on eighteenth-century festival accounts to explore how colonial residents of the silver-mining town of Potosí, in the viceroyalty of Peru, and the gold-mining region of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, created rich festive cultures that refuted European allegations of barbarism and greed. In her examination of the festive participation of the towns' diverse inhabitants, including those whose forced or slave labor produced the colonies' mineral wealth, Lisa Voigt shows how Amerindians, Afro-descendants, Europeans, and Creoles displayed their social capital and cultural practices in spectacular performances. Tracing the multiple meanings and messages of civic festivals and religious feast days alike, Spectacular Wealth highlights the conflicting agendas at work in the organization, performance, and publication of festivals. Celebrants and writers in mining boomtowns presented themselves as far more than tributaries yielding mineral wealth to the Spanish and Portuguese empires, using festivals to redefine their reputations and to celebrate their cultural, spiritual, and intellectual wealth. Book jacket.

Contents:

In praise of follies : Creole patriotism in the festivals of Arzáns's historia de la villa imperial de Potosí

Celebrating Minas Gerais in Triunfo Eucarístico and Aureo throno episcopal

Festive natives in Potosí, from audience to performance

"Nos pretos como no prelo" : Afro-Brazilians in festivals, from performance to print

Conclusion : spectacular tributes.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781477310502

1477310509

9781477310977

1477310975

OCLC:

934705730