Drinking, Homicide, and Rebellion in Colonial Mexican Villages

242 pages including bibliography and index. Octavo (8 1/4" x 5 1/4") bound in original wrappers. From the library of George M Foster.

This study analyzes the impact of Spanish rule on Indian peasant identity in the late colonial period by investigating three areas of social behavior. Based on the criminal trial records and related documents from the regions of central Mexico and Oaxaca, it attempts to discover how peasants conceived of their role under Spanish rule, how they behaved under various kinds of street, and how they felt about their Spanish overlords. In examining the character of village uprisings, typical relationships between killers and the people they killed, and the drinking patterns of the late colonial period, the author finds no warrant for the familiar picture of sullen depredation and despair. Landed persants of colonial Mexico drank moderately on the whole, and mostly on ritual occasions; they killed for personal and not political reasons. Only when new Spanish encroachments threatened their lands and livelihoods did their grievances flare up in rebellion, and these occasions were numerous but brief. The author bolsters his conclusions with illuminating comparisons with other peasant societies. George McClelland Foster, Jr was born in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on October 9, 1913, and died on May 18, 2006, at his home in the hills above the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, where he served as a professor from 1953 to his retirement in 1979, when he became professor emeritus. His contributions to anthropological theory and practice still challenge us; in more than 300 publications, his writings encompass a wide diversity of topics, including aculturation, long-term fieldwork, peasant economies, pottery making, public health, social structure, symbolic systems, technological change, theories of illness and wellness, humoral medicine in Latin America, and worldview. The quantity, quality, and long-term value of his scholarly work led to his election to the National Academy of Sciences in 1976. Virtually all of his major publications have been reprinted and/or translated. Provenance from the executor of Foster's library laid in.

Condition: Bumped gently along spine, and some rubbing on back cover edge, else a very good copy.