Early Ethnohistories of Religion in the Americas: Maya & Missionaries in Princeton’s Special Collections

The post-contact literature in Highland Mayan languages consist of some of the earliest autochthonous writings by Indigenous authors, in Indigenous languages, and exclusively for Indigenous readers. They also include defenses of Maya religion as well as their independent understandings of Christianity. Likewise, some of the earliest original missionary texts were also written in these same Mayan languages and their attempts to use aspects of Maya religion to convey Christianity. Aligned together, this large corpus evinces both transmission and reception histories of both a Native American religion and Hispano-Catholicism. And Princeton has one of the largest collections of these documents.

ABOUT OUR GUEST SPEAKER

Garry Sparks, Associate Professor in the Department of Religion

Garry Sparks focuses on ethnohistorical understandings of theological production in the Americas, particularly by Indigenous peoples. His areas include critical histories of Christian thought, religions of Indigenous peoples of the Americas, religion in Latin America, and theories of religion and culture.