La utopía biopolítica: Bartolomé de las Casas y la gestión de la vida indígena en el Memorial de remedios para las Indias (1516)

Authors

Keywords:

Colonial biopolitics, humanitarianism; government; agrarian communities, La Española; Carib; public health; refugees; human rights; remedial colonialism.

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between biopolitics and colonialism in the Memorial de Remedios para las Indias (1516) by Bartolomé de las Casas, a detailed government plan proposed to the Sovereign in response to the exploitation of indigenous people and the catastrophic depopulation of the Antilles. Las Casas argues that indigenous life is the responsibility of the Sovereign and that the economic prosperity of the kingdom depends on the care of the precarious lives of the population that works in the mines and agriculture. Lascasian design includes a series of agrarian communities of Spaniards and indigenous people organized under a governmental and biopolitical rationality that takes care of life management and health care (refugee camps, hospitals, food, reproduction and miscegenation), at the same time it delineates a series of anthropomorphic policies (education, evangelization, discipline). Las Casas advocates a sort of “peaceful coloniality” and a benevolent regulation of labor that is unraveled with the violent realities of primitive colonial accumulation. The interest in life is not simply a product of the Christian caritas or a Renaissance humanism interested in good treatment, but a proper biopolitical calculation.

 

Key words: Colonial biopolitics, humanitarianism; government; agrarian communities, La Española; Carib; public health; refugees; human rights; remedial colonialism.

Author Biography

Carlos Jáuregui , University of Notre Dame

Associate Professor of Latin American Literature and Anthropology, University of Notre Dame. Author of Espectros y conjuras: asedios a la cuestión colonial (forthcoming 2020); Canibalia (Casa de las Américas Award 2005; Iberoamericana 2008), Theatre of Conquest: Carvajal´s Complaint of the Indians in the “Court of Death” (Pennsylvania State UP 2008). Coeditor of Heterotropías (Iberoamericana 2003, with Juan Dabove), and of Colonialidad y crítica en América Latina (Universidad de Puebla 2007, with Mabel Moraña), Revisiting the Colonial Question (Iberoamericana 2008, with Moraña), Coloniality at Large. Latin America and the Postcolonial Debate (Duke UP 2008, with Enrique Dussel and Moraña), Of Rage and Redemption: The Art of Oswaldo Guayasamín (Vanderbilt University 2008, with Joseph Mella and Edward Fischer) and Emiliano Zapata: 100 años, 100 fotos (Universidad de los Andes; forthcoming  2020; co-edited with David Solodkow and Karina Herazo) .

 

David Mauricio Adriano Solodkow

Associate Professor of Latin American Literature and Director of the Center for Research (CIC) in the School of Arts and Humanities at the Universidad de los Andes, Colombia. Author of Ficción biopolítica y eugenesia en el Martín Fierro (Ediciones Uniandes, 2014); Etnógrafos coloniales. Alteridad y escritura en la Conquista de América. (Siglo XVI) (Iberoamericana / Vervuert, 2014); Coeditor of Sujetos múltiples. Colonialidad, indigenismo y feminismo. Homenaje a Betty Osorio. (with Carolina Alzate Cadavid. Ediciones Uniandes. 2014); Perspectivas sobre el Renacimiento y el Barroco (Ediciones Uniandes. 2011); and Poéticas de lo criollo. La transformación del concepto ‘criollo’ en las letras hispanoamericanas (siglos XVI al XIX) (with Juan Vitulli, Corregidor, 2009); Emiliano Zapata: 100 años, 100 fotos (Universidad de los Andes; forthcoming  2020; co-edited with Carlos A. Jáuregui, and Karina Herazo) .

Memorandum: “Hypothesis—the GOA as Prisoner of Army Intelligence”

Downloads

Published

2020-10-14

How to Cite

Jáuregui , C. ., & Solodkow, D. M. (2020). La utopía biopolítica: Bartolomé de las Casas y la gestión de la vida indígena en el Memorial de remedios para las Indias (1516). A Contracorriente: Una Revista De Estudios Latinoamericanos, 18(1), 26–56. Retrieved from https://acontracorriente.chass.ncsu.edu/index.php/acontracorriente/article/view/2033

Issue

Vol. 18 No. 1 (2020): Fall 2020

Section

Articles / Artículos

License

1. Author hereby grants, transfers, and assigns to A Contracorriente:

(a) the exclusive first serial rights in the Work for publication and distribution throughout the world, as A Contracorriente sees fit, in all languages and formats, by print or any electronic means, including, without limitation, the internet, other public and/or private proprietary intranets and computer networks and on CD-ROMs, DVDs and other discs, before the Work shall appear in any other publication (whether print or electronic), in any manner, format or language, or in any other medium now known or hereafter devised. The first serial rights granted to A Contracorriente by this Paragraph 1(a) shall be exclusive to A Contracorriente until one year following the date of the first serial publication of the Work by A Contracorriente; in addition, this grant of rights shall include the non-exclusive right in perpetuity to include the Work in any collection, or compilation produced or authorized by A Contracorriente, and containing at least 75% material that has appeared in A Contracorriente, for distribution throughout the world, in all languages and formats, by print or any electronic means, including, without limitation, the internet and other public and proprietary intranets and computer networks and on CDROMs, DVDs and other discs;

(b) further, the non-exclusive right to authorize, reproduce and distribute reprints of the Work throughout the world, in all languages and formats, by print or any electronic means, after the Work appears in a publication produced or authorized by A Contracorriente; the right to permit subscribers and other users of the services and publications in which the Work may appear electronically to download, reproduce, and otherwise utilize the Work for their personal, non-commercial use throughout the universe; and the non-exclusive perpetual right, throughout the world, to use the Work, in whole or in part, and Author’s name, likeness, or biography in promoting, advertising, and/or publicizing any publication in which the Work is authorized to appear consistent with this Agreement.

2. A Contracorriente reserves the right to publish the Work with illustrations and other graphic materials. Nothing contained herein shall obligate A Contracorriente to exploit any of the rights granted to A Contracorriente hereunder. All rights not granted to A Contracorriente are reserved to Author for Author’s own use and/or transfer, assignment, or disposition.

3. Author represents and warrants: the Work is original to Author, has not been copied in whole or in part, and does not infringe upon the copyright or any other rights of any person or entity; Author has the right to grant the rights granted to A Contracorriente under this Agreement free of any and all claims and encumbrances; Author has not granted or transferred any rights in or to the Work to any third party; and Author has not done and will not do anything that has impaired, might impair or will impair in any way any of the rights granted to A Contracorriente hereunder.

4. Author shall defend, indemnify, and hold harmless the NC State and its employees, agents, affiliates, successors, licensees, and assigns from and against all claims, damages, liabilities, losses, costs, and expenses, including, without limitation, attorney’s fees and costs, arising out of any breach or alleged breach of any of Author’s representations, warranties, or agreements. Any remedies that Author may have against A Contracorriente for breach of this Agreement shall be limited to the right to recover damages, if any, in an action at law. Author hereby waives any right or remedy in equity, including any right to terminate this Agreement, to rescind A Contracorriente’s rights in the Work, or to enjoin, restrain, or otherwise impair in any manner the production or distribution of any publication that is authorized or produced by A Contracorriente.

5. A Contracorriente shall have the right to assign this Agreement, either in whole or in part, to any entity affiliated with A Contracorriente or to any party that acquires all or substantially all of A Contracorriente's assets. Author shall not have the right to further assign any of the rights conferred pursuant to this Agreement, either in whole or in part, or any of the rights granted to Author herein.

6. This Agreement is intended by the parties hereto as the final expression of their understanding with respect to the subject matter herein, as a complete and exclusive statement of the terms herein, and supersedes any and all prior or contemporaneous negotiations, understandings, and agreements between the parties relating thereto.

7. The Agreement may be modified only by a writing signed by both parties to the Agreement. The laws and courts of the State of North Carolina shall govern and control the resolution of any and all conflicts and disputes that may arise hereunder.