Dangerous Speech is the first systematic treatment of blasphemous speech in colonial Mexico. This engaging social history examines the representation of blasphemy as a sin and a crime, and its repression by the Spanish Inquisition. The Spanish colonists viewed blasphemy not only as an insult against God but also as a dangerous misrepresentation of the deity, which could call down his wrath in a ruinous assault on the imperial enterprise. Why then, asks Villa-Flores, did Spaniards dare to blaspheme? Having mined the period’s moral literature—philosophical works as well as royal decrees and Inquisition treatises and trial records in Spanish, Mexican, and U.S. archives and research libraries—Villa-Flores deftly interweaves images of daily life in colonial Mexico with vivid descriptions of human interactions to illustrate the complexity of a culture profoundly influenced by the Catholic Church. In entertaining and sometimes horrifying vignettes, the reader comes face to face with individuals who used language to assert or manipulate their identities within that repressive society. Villa-Flores offers an innovative interpretation of the social uses of blasphemous speech by focusing on specific groups—conquistadors, Spanish settlers, Spanish women, and slaves of both genders—as a lens to examine race, class, and gender relations in colonial Mexico. He finds that multiple motivations led people to resort to blasphemy through a gamut of practices ranging from catharsis and gender self-fashioning to religious rejection and active resistance. Dangerous Speech is a valuable resource for students and scholars of colonialism, the social history of language, Mexican history, and the changing relations of gender, class, and ethnicity in colonial Latin America.

Soon after the fall of the Aztec empire in 1521, missionaries began teaching Latin to native youths in Mexico. This initiative was intended to train indigenous students for positions of leadership, but it led some of them to produce significant writings of their own in Latin, and to translate a wide range of literature, including Aesop's fables, into their native language. Aztec Latin reveals the full extent to which the first Mexican authors mastered and made use of European learning and provides a timely reassessment of what those indigenous authors really achieved.

Bridging the gap between histories of medicine and political/institutional histories of the early modern crown, this book explores the relationship between one of the most highly bureaucratic regimes in early modern Europe, Spain, and crown interest in and regulation of medical practices. Complementing recent histories that have emphasized the interdependent nature of governance between the crown and municipalities in sixteenth-century Spain, this study argues that medical policies were the result of negotiation and cooperation among the crown, the towns, and medical practitioners. During the reign of Philip II (1556-1598), the crown provided unique opportunities for advancements in the medical field among practitioners and support for the creation and dissemination of innovative medical techniques. In addition, crown support for and regulation of medicine served as an important bureaucratic tool in the crown's effort to expand and solidify its authority over the distinct kingdoms and territories under Castilian authority and the municipalities within the kingdom of Castile itself. The crown was not the only agent of change in the medical world, however. Medical policies and their successful implementation required consensus and cooperation among competing political authorities. Bringing to life a cast of characters from early modern Spain, from the female empiric who practiced bonesetting and surgery to the university-trained, Latin physician whose medical textbook standardized medical education in the universities, the book will broaden the scope of medical history to include not only the development of medical theory and innovative practice, but also address the complex tensions between various authorities which influenced the development and nature of medical practice and perceptions of 'public health' in early modern Europe. Juxtaposing the history of medicine with the history of early modern state-building brings a unique perspective to this challenging book that reassesses the relationship between the monarch and intellectual milieu of medicine in Spain. It further challenges the dominance of studies of medical regulation from France and England and illuminates a diverse and innovative world of Spanish medical practice that has been neglected in standard histories of early modern medicine.

Disenchanted with biomedicine and dismayed by its cost, increasing numbers of people are seeking alternative therapies such as the healing plants discussed in this book. Plant medicine is a billion-dollar business: health food stores, small yerberias, and even giant grocery store chains carry hundreds of medicinal herbs. By one estimate, up to one-third of the U.S. population uses alternative medicine—generally in addition to conventional therapy and commonly without telling their doctors. The heart of this volume is a complete description of 100 plants commonly used today, often for the same purposes reported by chroniclers of the Aztecs or eighteenth-century European explorers. Information for each plant includes botanical and common plant names, history, contemporary uses, a description of how the plant is prepared and administered, and brief phytochemical data. Discussions of folk efficacy and folk properties—beliefs in how and why the herb heals—help to explain the continued use of each plant into the present day. Are any of these plants dangerous, and do any of them really work? Where did they come from, and where are they available now? How can health-care practitioners gain the confidence of their patients to learn whether they are using alternative medicines for specific illnesses, symptoms, or injuries? Perhaps most intriguing, which of these plants might be waiting to take the place of known antibiotics as pathological organisms become increasingly resistant to modern miracle drugs? Answers to these and other questions will pique the interest of general readers and will be an invaluable resource for health-care providers—especially nurses and other primary-care providers, who often must find an interface between biomedical and more traditional therapies. For all readers, the book opens a window into many ethnic cultures of the region—Mexican American communities, desert Pima, coastal Seri, and others. Here is the fascinating saga of how their healing plants from prehistoric times melded with Old World herbs brought by the Europeans to create the unique pharmacopoeia available today here and in other parts of the world. Plants included: Acacia (Cassie, Acacia) Achillea (Yarrow) Agastache (Giant Hyssop) Agave (Century Plant) Allium (Garlic, Onion) Aloe (Aloe) Ambrosia (Ragweed) Anemopsis (Yerba Mansa) Arctostaphylos (Bearberry, Uva Ursi) Argemone (Prickly Poppy) Aristolochia (Bithwort, Snakeroot) Arracacia (Arracacha) Artemisia (Wormwood, Mugwort, Western Mugwort, Sagebrush) Asclepias (Milkweed) Baccharis (Desert Broom, Seep Willow) Bocconia (Tree Celandine) Buddleia (Butterfly Bush) Bursera (Elephant Tree) Caesalpinia (Mexican Bird-of-Paradise) Cannabis (Marijuana) Capsicum (Chili) Carnegiea (Saguaro) Casimiroa (Zapote) Cassia (Senna) Cereus (Cactus) Chenopodium (Goosefoot, Wormseed) Citrus (Lemon, Lime, Orange) Datura (Jimson Weed) Ephedra (Mormon Tea) Equisetum (Horsetail) Eryngium (Eryngo, Button Snakeroot) Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus) Euphorbia (Spurge) Eysenhardtia (Kidneywood) Gnaphalium (Everlasting, Cudweed) Guaiacum (Lignum Vitae) Guazuma (Guazuma) Gutierrezia (Turpentine Bush) Haematoxylon (Logwood) Haplopappus (Jimmyweed) Heterotheca (Telegraph Plant, Falso Arnica) Hintonia (Copalqu¡n) Ibervillea (Coyote Melon) Jacquinia (Jacquinia) Jatropha (Limberbush) Juniperus (Juniper) Karwinskia (Coffeeberry) Kohleria (Tree Gloxinia) Krameria (Ratany) Lantana (Lantana) Larrea (Creosote Bush, Greasewood) Ligusticum (Lovage) Lippia (Oregano) Lysiloma (Featherbush) Malva (Mallow) Mammillaria (Pincushion Cactus) Mascagnia (Mascagnia) Matricaria (Chamomile) Mentha (Mint) Nicotiana (Tobacco) Ocimum (Basil) Opuntia (Cholla, Prickly Pear) Perezia (Perezia) Persea (Avocado) Phaseolus (Bean) Phoradendron, Stru

This fascinating history explores the dynamic relationship between overseas colonisation in Spanish America and the bodily experience of eating.