Etnicidad en clave histórica: Categorías jurídicas coloniales y cultura maya en el siglo XVI

Abstract

For several decades the issue of ethnicity had been at the center of debate, in which was at stake the recognition of a set of rights to Native peoples, by National States of Latin America. By way of consequence, many studies from anthropology to political sciences, have analyzed ethnic movements, as well as the different answers that were given to them by national or international, governmental or extra-governmental institutions and organizations. The present article reflects on the possibility to approach those contemporaneous questions from an historical perspective without committing anachronism. Consequently, will be analyzed the process of creation of the juridical categories that were assigned to Native peoples by the Spanish Crown during the XVI century. Furthermore, we will analyze how indigenous actors used, rejected or combined, those official categories in order to protect their interests and to define themselves in the new political order imposed by the Spanish Crown. This study will be focused on the Mayas of Yucatan and on the answers they gave to those imperial policies in the first century of colonization.