Output details

Entrelazando dos mundos: Experimentos y experiencias con el quechua de la cristianización en el Perú colonial

The 526-page study examines the usage and re-elaboration of the 17th century Quechua language of Peru by analysing and translating comprehensive and highly complex corpora of texts written by missionaries and indigenous authors in order to introduce and re-work Christianity into colonial life. Apart from primary language material a large corpus of secondary literature on Christianity in Europe had to be evaluated. The analysis of this evidence leads to a new thesis – the creation of an indigenous genre of verbal art in the 17th century Andes – and has the potential to be verified for other cultural areas in similar settings.

Dedenbach's analysis of the Quechua language of Christianisation created by the Catholic Church in 16th century Peru shows that what had been developed with the objective of unifying Christian Quechua reflects individual methods, thereby contributing to the creation of an ambiguous language of Christianisation. Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala and the authors of the Huarochirí texts (17th century) document their experience with this Christian vocabulary which they integrated into their own intentionally multi-interpretable discourse (sermons, prayers and testimony). Thereby, and by using discursive traditions from Europe and the Andes, they created a new genre of indigenous colonial verbal art.