Native Christians: Modes and Effects of Christianity among Indigenous Peoples of the Americas

by Wright,Robin M.

• ISBN13: 9780754663553
• ISBN10: 0754663558
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-02-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Native Christians reflects on the modes and effects of Christianity among indigenous peoples of the Americas drawing on comparative analysis of ethnographic and historical cases. Christianity in this region has been part of the process of conquest and domination, through the association usually made between civilizing and converting. While Catholic missions have emphasized the 'civilizing' process, teaching the Indians the skills which they were expected to exercise within the context of a new societal model, the Protestants have centered their work on promoting a deep internal change, or 'conversion', based on the recognition of God's existence.Various ethnologists and scholars of indigenous societies have focused their interest on understanding the nature of the transformations produced by the adoption of Christianity. The contributors in this volume take native thought as the starting point, looking at the need to relativise these transformations. Each author examines different ethnographic cases throughout the Americas, both historical and contemporary, enabling the reader to understand the indigenous points of view in the processes of adoption and transformation of new practices, objects, ideas and values.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Towards a comparative study of Jesuit missions and indigenous peoples in 17th-century Canada and Paraguay

Christians. A transforming concept in Peruvian Amazonia

'Before we were all Catholics': changing religion in Apiao, Southern Chile

Money, loans and faith: narratives and images of wealth, fertility, and salvation in the Northern Andes

The re-invention of Mapuche male shamans as Catholic priests: legitimizing indigenous co-gender identities in modern Chile

Protestant evangelism and the transformability of Amerindian bodies in Northeastern Amazonia

The skin of history: Paumari perspectives on conversion and transformation

Christianity, perspective and predation

Shamans and missionaries

Transitions and transformations in the Kivalliq coastal area

Baniwa art: the Baniwa Protestant ethic and the spirit of sustainable development

Divine Child and trademark: economy, morality and cultural sustainability of a Guarana project among the Satere-Mawe, Brazil

Afterword

Index

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

Excerpts

Various ethnologists and scholars of indigenous societies have focused their interest on understanding the nature of the transformations produced by the adoption of Christianity. The contributors in this volume take native thought as the starting point, looking at the need to relativise these transformations. Each author examines different ethnographic cases throughout the Americas, both historical and contemporary, enabling the reader to understand the indigenous points of view in the processes of adoption and transformation of new practices, objects, ideas and values.