Prof. Sinclair Thomson
History of the Andes:
Deep Rivers and Rivers of Blood
(HIST-UA 753)
Spring 2014
Meets: Tu, Th 9:30-10:45 am
53 Washington Square South, Rm. 414 ST’s office hours: Tu 2:00-4:00 pm
The purpose of the course is to introduce students to the long-term historical development of the Andean region. One of the core regions of Latin America, the Andes are distinguished by their extraordinary environmental conditions, the historical strength of indigenous culture, and the outcome of the engagement between native American society and Western colonial and capitalist forces. This outcome has been and continues to be the subject of vigorous debates within Andean countries, debates that hinge on historical interpretation. The course examines divergent views concerning the progressive or tragic nature of history in the Andes; dualistic, antagonistic, and synthetic models of social relations; exceptionalist and utopian notions of “Andean” identity, as well as critiques of these. We will take the Peruvian writer and ethnographer José María Arguedas as an exemplary figure whose life, work, and death, as well as the controversy surrounding them, will provide a focus for our concerns and connect disparate elements in the course.
For Arguedas, the Andes were a place of beautiful, profound tradition (“deep rivers”) as well as a difficult point of convergence between clashing cultural sources (“rivers of blood”).
The course will cover pre-conquest, colonial, and contemporary periods, especially for the southern Andean region of what is today Peru and Bolivia. Course themes will include: Andean regional and cultural identity; Andean ecology and peasant agriculture; local native society and the Inka; colonialism, nationalism and race; global commodity production (from silver to coca) and economic dependency; Indian and working-class political struggles. The mix of class materials and sources includes ethnography and history, testimonial literature, journalism, photography, film, and fiction.
The assignments for the class consist of two papers and selected weekly comments on the readings:
*The papers should be anywhere from 7 to 10 pages in length. Topics are to be chosen by students, based on common course materials or other materials determined in consultation with the instructor. Outside reading and research are not required for the papers, but will often strengthen them. The first paper is due on March 20; the second on
May 13.
*The weekly comments should be short (approx. 1-2 pages) and should accomplish two tasks: demonstrate your understanding of the content of the reading and express your

reaction to it (e.g., what do you find most interesting, compelling, or disturbing?). You are expected to turn in a total of six weekly comments during the semester, on weeks that you choose. These comments will not be individually graded, but you will be expected to turn them in as part of normal class participation. They will give students a chance to absorb the readings in preparation for class, and to give the instructor an idea of individual responses to the material we cover. They are due on Thursdays, when we will discuss the readings.
* Participation in class discussion is highly encouraged. You are expected to do the reading, normally for Thursday’s class, even if you are not writing a comment that week.
A significant portion of Thursday sessions will be devoted to group discussion.
*For the final grade : the papers will each count for 30%, the weekly comments plus other participation in class discussion will count 40%.
Recommended book:
Orin Starn, Carlos Iván Degregori, and Robin Kirk, eds., The Peru Reader: History,
Culture, and Politics (Duke Univ. Press, 1995).
Opening Themes
Week 1 (Jan. 28, 30)
--Introduction to Andean history
--The question of Andean identity
Mythical, Historical, and Geographical Foundations
Week 2 (Feb. 4, 6)
--Landscapes and regions
--Vertical ecology and agriculture
Reading:
Karen Spalding, Huarochirí: An Andean Society Under Inca and Spanish Rule (1984), pp. 1-71.
Week 3 (Feb. 11, 13)
--Prehistory and origin myths
Reading for Tuesday :
Guy Gugliotta, “Earliest Urban Society in Americas Found at Peruvian Sites,”
Washington Post , 23 December 2004.
Brian Fagan, “The Chavín Cult,” in Orin Starn, Carlos Iván Degregori, and Robin Kirk, eds., The Peru Reader: History, Culture, and Politics (1995), pp. 17-27.
Father Bernabé Cobo, Inca Religion and Customs (1990 [1653]), pp. 11-13.
--Gods and peoples of Huarochirí
Reading for Thursday :

Frank Salomon and George Urioste, The Huarochirí Manuscript: A Testament of Ancient and Colonial Andean Religion (1991, [c. 1608]), pp. 41-126 (and review pp. 1-
28) .
Week 4 (Feb. 18, 20)
--Local society and belief
--Inka integration
Reading:
Spalding, pp. 72-105.
Felipe Huaman Poma de Ayala, Letter to a King: A Peruvian Chief’s Account of Life under the Incas and under Spanish Rule (1978 [1615]), pp. 18-59, 69-79, 86-89,
102.
Colonial Chronicles and Conflicts
Week 5 (Feb. 25, 27)
--Waman Poma de Ayala
Reading:
Mario Vargas Llosa, “Questions of Conquest: What Columbus Wrought, and What He
Did Not,” Harper’s 281 (1687): 45-53, 1990.
Spalding, pp. 106-167.
Huaman Poma de Ayala, pp. 128-149, 166-170, 193-196, 201-213.
Week 6 (Mar. 4, 6)
--The mountain of silver
--Peruvian economic space
Reading:
Spalding, pp. 168-238.
Bartolomé Arzáns de Orsúa y Vela, Tales of Potosí (1975 [1736]), pp. 3-12, 20-26, 33-
36, 51-55, 58-70, 116-126.
Eduardo Galeano, “The Splendors of Potosí,” from Open Veins of Latin America (1971).
Week 7 (Mar. 11, 13)
--Anticolonial insurrection
Reading:
Spalding, pp. 239-304.
Alberto Flores Galindo, “The Rebellion of Túpac Amaru,” in Starn et al., eds., The Peru
Reader (1995), pp. 147-156.
The plan of Túpac Amaru, in Benjamin Keen, ed., Latin American Civilization: History and Society, 1492 to Present (1996), pp. 141-143.
The proclamation of Julián Puma Catari to the people of La Paz, in Jonathan Brown, ed.,
Latin America: A Social History of the Colonial Period (2000), p. 336.
Letter from Micaela Bastidas to Túpac Amaru, in Jonathan Brown, ed., Latin America: A
Social History of the Colonial Period (2000), p. 332.

José Antonio de Areche’s death sentence for Túpac Amaru, in Starn et al., eds., The Peru
Reader (1995), pp 157-161.
Week 8 (Mar. 18, 20)
SPRING BREAK
Modern Movements and Conflicts
Week 9 (Mar. 25, 27)
--From independence to the oligarchic republic
--Indigenismo
In class this week we will see a documentary about a celebrated Cuzco photographer,
“Martín Chambi and the Heirs of the Inkas” (BBC, 1986).
Reading:
Flora Tristan, “Peregrinations of a Self-Proclaimed Pariah,” in June Hahner, ed., Women through Women’s Eyes: Latin American Women in Nineteenth-Century Travel
Accounts (1998), pp. 21-41.
Clorinda Matto de Turner, Birds Without a Nest (1996 [1889]).
PAPER DUE : March 20
Week 10 (Apr. 1, 3)
--The oligarchic republic and its discontents
-- Socialism and modernity
Reading:
Juan Pévez, “Water!,” in Orin Starn et al., eds., The Peru Reader (1995), pp. 223-227.
José Carlos Mariátegui, “Reflections,” in Orin Starn et al., eds., The Peru Reader (1995), pp. 228-233.
José Carlos Mariátegui, Seven Interpretive Essays on Peruvian Reality (1971 [1928]), pp. xxxiii-xxxiv, 3-76, 182-184, 268-283, 286-287.
Recommended for those who understand Spanish: Talk by Gilles Riviere, a distinguished French ethnographer, on traditional political organization and new social movements in Aymara-speaking communities in Bolivia. Talk at 12:30 on
April 10, KJCC 404W.
Week 11 (Apr. 8, 10)
--Agrarian reform and nationalization
We will be joined in class this week by Carmen Soliz, an NYU PhD student working on agrarian reform in 20 th
-century Bolivia.
Reading:
José María Arguedas, Yawar Fiesta (2002 [1944]).
Week 12 (Apr. 15, 17)
--The wages of political violence and U.S. intervention
--Battles over coca and cocaine

We will be joined in class this week by Silvia Rivera, a noted Bolivian sociologist and activist.
Reading:
Catherine Allen, “The Hold Life Has,” in Orin Starn et al., eds., The Peru Reader (1995), pp. 388-400.
Coca love song, in Orin Starn et al., eds., The Peru Reader (1995), pp. 401.
Jo Ann Kawell, “The Cocaine Economy,” in Orin Starn et al., eds., The Peru Reader
(1995), pp. 402-414.
Hugo Cabieses, “Peru: The Cocalero Struggles and Good Governance,” Drugs and
Conflict Debate Papers 10: 15-27, 2004.
Allison Spedding, “The Coca Field as a Total Social Fact,” in Madeleine Barbara Léons and Harry Sanabria, eds., Coca, Cocaine, and the Bolivian Reality (1997), pp. 47-
70.
Ana María Lema, “The Coca Debate and Yungas Landowners during the First Half of the
20 th
Century,” in Madeleine Barbara Léons and Harry Sanabria, eds., Coca,
Cocaine, and the Bolivian Reality (1997), pp. 99-115.
Allison Spedding, “The Cocalero Movement and Drug Policy in Bolivia,” Drugs and
Conflict Debate Papers 10: 3-14, 2004.
Coletta Youngers, “Collateral Damage: The U.S. ‘War on Drugs’ and Its Impact on
Democracy in the Andes,” in Jo-Marie Burt and Philip Mauceri, eds., Politics in the Andes: Identity, Conflict, Reform (2004).
13 24)
--“Development” from industrialization to neoliberalism
--The contradictions of José María Arguedas I
Reading:
José María Arguedas, The Fox from Up Above and the Fox from Down Below (2000
[1969]), pp. 9-189.
Week 14 (Apr. 29, May 1)
--Neoliberal crisis and alternative popular and nationalist outlooks
-- The contradictions of José María Arguedas II
Reading:
Arguedas, The Fox… , pp. 193-270.
Week 15 (May 6, 8)
--New social movements, ethnicity, and conflicts over natural resources and environment
--Conclusions: Contemporary contradictions and visions of the future
PAPER DUE : Tuesday, May 13