Antropological Studies in Yucatan

University of California Institute for Mexico and the United States
Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico

Review: Anthropological Studies in Yucatan and the Historical Dimension
Reviewed Work(s): L'agriculture, la peche et l'artisanat au Yucatan: Proletarisation de la
paysannerie maya au Mexique by Yvan Breton and Marie-France Labrecque; Maya Society
under Colonial Rule: The Collective Enterprise of Survival by Nancy M. Farriss; Mrida; Su
transformacin: De capital colonial a naciente metropoli en 1935 by Asael T. Hansen and
Juan R. Bastarrachea M.; Haciendas en Yucatn, Mxico by Carlos R. Kirk; Los mayas
rebeldes de Yucatn by Marie Lapointe
Review by: Herman W. Konrad
Source: Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Winter, 1987), pp. 163-180
Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the University of California
Institute for Mexico and the United States and the Universidad Nacional Autnoma de
Mxico
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Anthropological Studies in Yucatan

and the Historical Dimension
Herman W. Konrad
University of Calgary
L'agriculture, la peche et I'artisanat au Yucatan: Proletarisation

paysannerie maya au Mexique. By Yvan Breton et Marie-France
Labrecque. (Quebec: les presses de L'Universite Laval, 1981).
Maya Society Under Colonial Rule: The Collective Enterprise of Sur

vival. By Nancy M. Farriss. (Princeton: Princeton University Pr
1984).
Mdrida; Su transformaci6n: de capital colonial a naciente metropoli

en 1935. By Asael T. Hansen and Juan R. Bastarrachea M. (Mexico:
Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, 1984).
Haciendas en Yucatan, Mexico. By Carlos R. Kirk. (Mexico: Instituto

Nacional Indigenista, 1982).
Los mayas rebeldes de Yucatdn. By Marie Lapointe. (Zamora: El Colegio
de Michoacin, 1983).
The Mayan cultural tradition in the Yucatan peninsula has long

been an attractive magnet for the international academic community
as well as traveller and tourist. As the focus of research activities this
relatively small geographic corner of Mexico has attracted a disproportionately large attention, in the past as it continues in the
present. And in contrast to the Maya Highlands, where anthropological case-studies have dominated and surpassed the historical output
by a wide margin, this lowland area has been characterized by a
research tradition which as always had a strong historical focus. Yet
both areas experienced roughly the same pre-classical, classical and
post-classical cultural sequences on Maya civilization; both suffered
the same fate of conquest and socio-political marginality during the
colonial period; and both remain, in recent times, among the least
integrated and industrialized sectors of the contemporary Mexican
Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos 3 (1), Winter 1987. @ 1987 Regents of the University of California.
163
164 Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos
national state. As well, both areas have relatively wea

demic institutions fostering anthropological and histor
endeavors. None of the works reviewed in this essay,
noted, were published near to the area of interest; rath
from presses located in Mexico City, Zamora (Michoac
ton, and Quebec City, underscoring the academic preo
outsiders with the area and its cultural past and pres
The recent publication of Asael T. Hansen's Merida
the genesis of this monograph is a convenient point of
placing these studies and anthropological research a
into historical perspective. In a real sense this work is

past as it was originally planned as one of the case-stu
1930s Carnegie Institution of Washington (CIW) sp
Robert Redfield directed program of regional researc

research effort began much earlier, before World War
direction of Sylvanus G. Morley, with a primary focu
ogy and a rediscovery of the ancient Maya past. After alm
cades of archaeological effort the CIW Department
Research, which was responsible for the research activ

to broaden the scope of investigation to include not on
major branches of anthropology (ethnology, linguistics
thropology) but also history, botany, medicin
geography-in effect a multi-disciplinary and compreh

By 1930 a variety of north American institutions (Chic
Michigan, New Mexico) and specialists were being a

the 1930s became one of the most fruitful decades of
studies research. Robert Redfield (University of Chicag
Alfonso Villa Rojas and the Hansens, began the series o
studies resulting in the Chan Kom case-study (Redfie
Rojas), the East Central Quintana Roo ethnography (Vi
the then important and later controversial Folk Cultu
(Redfield) synthesis.3 At the same time France V. Scho
Roys began their historical studies which eventually i
ars such as J. Ignacio Rubio Mane, Eleanor B. Adams, R
1. An excellent background as well as details about on-going C

tution of Washington activities is available from its annual reports
Carnegie Institution of Washington, Year Book, Nos. 1-50, Washin
2. Both studies appeared originally in the publication series of
Institution of Washington, Nos. 448 and 559: Robert Redfield and Alf
Chan Kom, A Maya Village (Washington, 1934), and Alfonso Villa R
of East Central Quintana Roo (Washington, 1945). The more popu
version of Chan Kom was published by the University of Chicago in
field's restudy, A Village that Chose Progress: Chan Kom Revisited
3. Robert Redfield, The Folk Culture of Yucatan (Chicago,
Konrad: Anthropological Studies 165

berlain, Lewis Hanke, Howard Cline and Alfredo Barerra Vasquez.
The resulting historical research and publications set the stage for
virtually all subsequent research in the area.
The one study that failed to materialize was that of Hansen, who
was given the task of doing a study of Merida, the urban end of Red-
field's perceived rural-urban continuum. The Hansens arrived in

Merida in August 1931 and apart from a brief absence (August 1933
to January 1934) were engaged in the M&rida project until December 1934. Hansen subsequently took teaching posts at the Univer-
sity of Miami (Ohio) and the University of Alabama. Redfield's

progress reports, published in the CIW Yearbooks, indicated the
Hansen monograph would be ready for publication "before the end
of 1937" (No. 35, 1935-36, p. 133), then "this should be ready in
1939" (No. 37, 1937-38, p. 162), after which it no longer receives
mention. In the meantime the CIW sponsored anthropological fieldwork expanded into the highlands and generated a substantial body
of published works. Such research activity helped launch the careers
of a great number of anthropologists, including E. Wyllys Andrews
IV, Ruth Bunzel, George Brainerd, Fernando Camara Barbachano,
Alfredo Barerra Vasquez, John P. Gillin, Calixta Quiteras Holmes,
Benjamin Paul, Ricardo Posas Arciniegas, Juan Rosales, William

Saunders, Anna O. Shepard, Sol Tax, J. Eric Thompson, Melvin
Tumin, Robert Wauchope, and Charles Wisdom. And in various
ways, institutionally and via their publications, these scholars helped
shape the direction and content of much of the Maya research that
followed up to the present day. The Hansen study, despite the fact
that Redfield used some of his data for his synthesis of Yucatan cultural configurations, did not leave a similar legacy.
Forty years later, after Hansen had retired from active teaching,
he returned to Merida and with the sponsorship of the Merida

branch of the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia (INAH),
the manuscript was finally completed with the assistance of Juan
Bastarrachea M. This was in 1976 and it remained "in press" until
1984. The INAH support was designed to finish the original mono-
graph and to produce a second volume which would bring the

Merida study up to date. This accounts for the 1935 terminal date
of a study finally published in 1984, or precisely 50 years after the
research had been completed. Thus, it deliberately does not include
reference to or incorporate insights in anthropology or Yucatan
post-dating its research. This may be seen as both a weakness-if the
second volume fails to become a reality as is most likely-and a
strength, since it provides the reader with a historical document

from the past. It does represent a monument to enduring persistence
while providing a useful gauge of the state-of-the-art in the 1930s.
And, as will be indicated in my review of the othe

of-the-art has undergone very significant transform
the study of Merida does not have the benefit of t
generated by the CIW, which constitute the basic
the other books being reviewed. But with its emer
instantly, a collector's item.
The Hansen book is divided into seventeen chapters which,
apart from a brief introduction and conclusion, can be divided into
two main sections. The first section, (Chapters 2-7), provide the
context, with historical, demographic, geographical data on

Merida's background and its regional and national context as of the
1930s. For the contemporary reader this is dated, incomplete data,
providing greater insights about the scarcity of available information
at the time than about the urban settlement founded by Francisco
Montejo on January 6, 1542, and which has dominated the peninsular economic, political and social activities until the present. The
second section, (Chapters 8-16), on the other hand, is of much

greater interest as it constitutes a pioneering urban ethnography. It
is somewhat selective ethnography emphasizing the interaction between traditional and modernization dynamics. Special attention is
paid to class structure, kinship, ideology (religion, magic), medical
systems, and rituals surrounding birth and death. The frame of refer-
ence here starts with the beginnings of the Porfiriato-in local terms
the emergence of the hard-fiber or henequen hacienda system-and
takes us till the mid 1930s immediately prior to Cairdenas Reforms
which shattered the oligarchic domination of the henequen

hacendados.
The key factors in transforming Merida from its colonial patter
of urban core, dominated by the traditional elite in control of

nomic, political, and religious institutions, and surrounded by
rios, occupied by the lesser social classes, according to Hansen,
economic ones. The city he found in the 1930s, and contrar

what his studies in urban sociology-particularly the Chicago S
of urban sociology-had taught him, was much more tradit
than industrial. It still had the basic physical configuration of a

industrial city despite Yucatan having been subject to half a cen
of industrialized production of hard-fiber for the international
ket. At the same time, however, there were signs of an emergin
dustrial urban pattern, with its central business core, sate
commercial enclaves, suburban residential areas, and a breakdo

of distinct, semi-autonomous barrios. The driving force for the
pattern, much more fully developed in more industrialized co
tries, was the henequen economy which had allowed the oligar
cal elite to expand into the north of the city dominated by
palatial residences along the Paseo de Montejo. Yet by 1

percent of the hacendados, doctors, and lawyers resided
central core area. As a metropolitan center Merida,

region's early economic era of "green gold," remaine
traditional.
The data on class structure, ideology, dress patterns, domestic

rituals, and individualistic versus kin-based activities also were
found to be more traditional than proposed-and concluded-by

Redfield's folk-urban hypothesis. Hansen goes so far as to admit that
he found Redfield's interpretive formulations less than convincing.
Whether this is an afterthought, added in a time period when Redfield's ideas had been shown to have less than a convincing fit for
Yucatan (keeping in mind that Hansen actually wrote this in the
1970s), is open to question. Redfield's influential Folk Culture of
Yucatan, derivative to a large extent from British structural functionalism, has long been a debating point of reference by anthropologists. Had the Hansen data been available much earlier, as originally
intended, that debate may well have taken on other dimensions. As
is, its importance for contemporary anthropology is greatly

diminished although its recent publication does provide helpful
historical insights about the nature of the research endeavor in the
past.
Kirk's Haciendas in Yucatan concentrates upon the key factor
that the CIW sponsored research of the 1930s and 1940s overlooked, although Hansen's work took it into consideration, that of
the henequen estates. His starting-point is the Cirdenas agrarian reforms which resulted in the breakup of the henequen private estates
and the emergence of the communal ejidos which were to become
the dominant form of production in northwestern Yucatan from the
late 1930s till the 1970s, after which henequen production became
a lesser factor in the regional economy. This case-study of one ejido,
whose actual identity and location are obscured by the use of pseudonyms, seeks to analyze the impact of agrarian reform and the
adaptive responses of the ejido to ongoing external economic influences. It is not a pioneering work insofar that there have been
numerous studies of the henequen zone.4 Rather it is the result of
4. Cf. Roland E. P. Chardon, Geographic Aspects of Plantation Agriculture
in Yucatan (Washington, 1961); Moises Gonzalez Navarro, Raza y Tierra: La guerra
de castas y el henequen (Mexico, 1970); Keith Harman, "The Henequen Empire in
Yucatan, 1870-1910," Master's thesis, University of Iowa, 1966; Nathaniel Raymond,
"The Impact of Land Reform in the Monocrop Region of Yucatan, Mexico," Ph.D.
diss., Brandeis University 1971; Malcolm K. Shuman, "The Town Where Luck Fell:
The Economics of Life in a Henequen Zone Pueblo," Ph.D. diss., Tulane University,
1974.
a doctoral research thesis, one of a number that gre

laborative Summer Research Project between Michig
sity and INAH.5 Fieldwork was conducted in the ej
in 1970 and 1971.
The legacy of the CIW project in Yucatan is evident in the for-
mulation and publication of this study. On the one hand, th
research took place under the direction of Fernando Camara Barbachano (then sub-director of INAH) who began his anthropological career in a CIW project and it was published by the Instituto
Nacional Indigenista (INI) whose publication program was under the
direction of Alfonso Villa Rojas, Redfield's original research collabo
rator. In a real sense, the CIW's early incorporation of Mexica
scholars had very tangible by-products in that through these individuals, who achieved national prominence, networks of continu-
ing research access became established, particularly for North

American students and professionals. The Harvard and Chicag
long-term anthropological projects in Highland Maya zones
Mexico and Guatemala, for example, grew out of the earlier contact
and became ongoing endeavors. And both INAH and INI, in their an
thropological publication series,6 have published many of th
research results, as is the case here. On the positive side, this resulted
in making available in Mexico, and in Spanish, the products o
research in Mexico; representing a counter-tendency to the practic

of outside researchers who have frequently exported their notes an
published their findings elsewhere and unavailable in Spanish or by
Mexicans. On the other hand, I have heard frequent complaints b
Mexican anthropologists that this working relationship with outsi
scholars has been at the expense of national scholarship, which h
been overlooked in these publication series, leading to the charge
of academic imperialism.
Kirk's monograph is actually less of a study of a henequen estate than it is about the processes of adaptation by an ejido commu
nity of 300 persons who became the recipients of henequen lands
because of the national agrarian reforms. As a study of peasant adap
tation it provides a considerable body of quantitative data o
5. Rodney C. Kirk, "San Antonio, Yucatan: From Henequen Hacienda to Plantation Ejido," Ph.D. diss., Michigan State University, 1975; Alice Littlefield, "Th
Hammock Industry in Yucatan, Mexico: A Study in Economic Anthropology," (Mich

gan State University, 197-).
6. INI's Serie de Antropologia Social began in 1963, and by 1982 published
66 titles, mostly the results of foreign investigators; the INAH Etnologia series start
at about the same time and produced over a hundred titles by 1982, these being most
the results of Mexican researchers.
production, income, expenses, kin and ritual relation
data is used to examine how an ejido community, formal

cially constituted as a logical implementation of national
benefited or, in this case, has survived the progressively
ing economic conditions surrounding the hard-fiber indu
catan. In a real sense it becomes a study of the persistenc
lifestyles, largely in spite of national policies designed t
and integrate peasant sectors into the national economy
of external forces is paramount, not only by national pol
trated through institutions located in Merida, but also by
collapse of international prices for the monocrop the c
produces. The viability of the local economy, in this ca
totally dependent upon federal subsidies to sustain econo
ties more for political reasons than any other. And with
piper 'paying for the tune' federal political manipulatio
a constant factor.
The peasant community adaptations become the dependent
variables in the larger dynamics of tradition versus change. The

granting of ejido lands to the community, although it lessened the
traditional patron-peon vertical dependency relationships (eco

nomic as well as fictive kinship) and enhanced horizontal
community-based kin relationships, saw the replacement of the
traditional hacendado patr6n by government (agrarian bank,
peasant league, governmental administrator) surrogates. Such patrons, being further removed from the actual process of production
on the henequen plantation, stimulated more diverse and complex
strategies by the peasant ejidatarios such as taking advantage of the
essentially political objectives of new patronage managers. What

they lacked in actual power to change economic conditions, they
made up for in attempting to manipulate, via accumulation of massive debts without intention of repayment, playing off one agency
against the other, or relying to a greater extent upon time-worn
subsistence strategies. Within the community this has meant an increasing reliance upon kin-based (or ritual-based) reciprocity arrangements and the backyard banking system (poultry, hogs and
other livestock) exchangeable for cash to meet special or emergency
occasions.
Kirk's study should be of great interest to anthropologists

cerned with peasant transitions and centralized planning att
to transform or modernize rural economies. If, as numerous i
tigators have indicated, the large-scale henequen haciendas in
pre-reform period began the process of rural proletarization
case-study suggests the opposite trend of peasantization as a
product of agrarian reform. Redfield's views of the peasa
condition-and Kirk does refer to the Redfield/

numerous points-are inadvertently supported
influences he postulated as the important ones.
lacks is a theoretical perspective which allows fo
larger societal issues, being long on data and a
short on relevant ideas. The book, as well, lack
index. Still, as a by-product of the type of cu
popular in North American graduate schools in
case-study offers much grit for further grindi
upon the key variable in the last century of Yu
henequen industry, at the same time emphasize
since the heyday of the CIW sponsored studies
In sharp contrast to Kirk's monograph Ivan
France Labrecque's L'agriculture, la peche e
pronounced theoretical perspective which stud

School of Anthropological Sciences would be ri
that of historical materialism. The authors-act
cludes the research of group investigators fro
(Quebec City)-concentrate upon a common th
contexts. They are interested in examining the
ization of the Maya peasantry as a by-product o
in the Mexican economy. The henequen indust
Kirk's study, becomes a central factor in the an
in his preface to the book, refers to the work
overt absence of the henequen factor as equiva
ten Hamlet without Horace. And if Horace rep
Yucatan's drama of development, Breton and L
his fair place on the stage. They open and close
ters dealing with the larger issues of interpre
while the main body of the text includes thre
most extensive treatment is of the henequen z
followed by an examination of fishing villages
(three chapters), and a brief (one chapter)
hammock-making. Since both the senior investi

dent assistants were in constant communicatio
tions do not suffer from lack of awareness of
investigating and the results being generated.
The area of research is located on the north
of the Yucatan henequen zone, near to where

study and just north and east of Motul. The fo
nities studied were Dzidzantun, Sinanche, Tem
the fishing communities (Chabihau and Dzilam
the northern coast nearby. Most of the data fo

also derive from Dzilam Bravo and Temax, or two communities
which include both henequen production and fishing activities. This

part of Yucatan has received very little anthropological attention,
which was a primary factor for choosing the area as a focus of study.
Another factor was the encouragement of Fernando Camara Barbachano for a more systematic program of anthropological research
in Yucatan. His involvement in the Michigan State University program, which resulted in Kirk's study and that of other doctoral students,7 was also present in the Laval program which took place
during 1973-1974. Assistance is also acknowledged from other

Mexican scholars with former CIW links (e.g. Alfredo Barerra
Vasquez) and with Juan Bastarrachea who assisted Hansen in finally
getting his Merida study published. The legacy of the earlier CIW
research is further evident in that this the Breton/Labrecque volume
was designed to correct deficiencies in the Redfield approach and
the background material utilized in the specific case-studies relies
very substantially upon the historical studies produced by the CIW
scholars.
The main thesis of L 'agriculture, la peche et l'artisanat is that

the development of capitalism in Mexico is having a profound impact upon the Maya peasant sectors, and contrary to the stated ideo
logical aims of agrarian reform along official socialist principles, is
resulting in an entirely capitalist model of development. The byproduct, as seen from these case-studies, has been a proletarizatio
of the peasant sector which is being forced into small-scale mercan
tile (or commercial) production, resulting in loss of control over th
means of production, increased dependence upon a largely urbanbased (Merida and Mexico City) bourgeoisie, and the replication of
an increasingly impoverished rural social class which, structurally
and functionally, differs little from the previous pre-reform oligar
chical henequen period. In the present case what has changed is the
source of capitalist impulses, the foreign capitalist that dominate
the henequen boom period has been replaced by state capitalism.
The theoretical thrust of this study derives from economic anthropology, influenced by historical materialism. This is seen as a
necessary corrective of not only the static, synchronic, Redfieldian
social anthropology but also the cultural and ethnographic emphasis that played such a large role in North American anthropology
prior to the 1970s. The source of theoretical ideas is much more in
line with the main currents dominating much of Mexican socia
7. Littlefield, "The Hammock Industry."
science and European anthropology. It is, at th

tive of much of the anthropological research b
French-Canadian scholars whose empathy for
also been much more pronounced than among t
colleagues. Extended residence in the communi
and the participant-observation generated mos
plemented by systematic review of historical
lished) sources and theoretical literature.
The strength of this study lies fundamental
consistent application of a theoretical model. Th
henequen communities is used to document how
stitutions control capital, the means of product
ing of henequen products, and the distribution
ejido lands, provided to ejido members to all
their means of production, it turns out, have
controlled by state agencies. And the ejidatorio
a decrease in their living standards but have a
ingly alienated from traditional peasant strate
production and the non-peasant agencies of co
sions differ fundamentally from those put forth
resulting class formations include the rural pro

of ejidatarios), a petite bourgeoisie or those ejid
own parcels of land, and the bourgeoisie or no
henequen estates. The last group is formed by t
pendents) hacendado class which resides in Mer
retain the building complexes of the old estate
processing facilities for converting the henequ
fiber, plus up to 400 hectares of land.
The north coast fishing communities exhibi
found in the henequen zone. Yucatan's fishi
although they represent five percent of Yucat

received virtually no anthropological attention
It is only recently that their activities have b
with a movement away from local markets to r
ones. The investment of capital by regional bu
national Productos Pesqueros Mexicanos has tra
ditional small-boat, hand-line, small-scale syst
which was sufficient to reproduce itself-into
time of the study roughly half of the fisherme
traditional manner with part of the catch destin
sumption while the rest was being sent to pac
keted regionally by other than local individua
catch, however, was being taken by compan
fishermen, and whom they supplied with capi
other facilities, or by individuals belonging to governm

sored cooperatives through which credit and marketing
were provided. And the data presented shows a clear pat
emergence of distinct social categories with reference
control of capital and equipment. The authors' conclude
cantile bourgeoisie controls the industry via its control o
markets while in the henequen zone state agencies fill th
ternal roles. In both cases they find a decomposition of
traditional patterns of production and the emergence of
cial classes.
The artisan case-study is the weakest of the three types of economic production analyzed in this book. A more complete and com
prehensive study here is that of Alice Littlefield,8 which relies on the
same theoretical and methodological approach and arrives at essen

tially the same conclusions as the Breton/Labrecque study. While
Littlefield concentrated upon the villages of Cacalchen and Tixcocob
the chapter in this book concentrates upon one community in th
henequen zone (Temax) and one of the fishing communities (Dzilam
Bravo). In both locations hammock-weaving and production of hu
piles are the activities studied. These activities have a heavy involve
ment by women and represent complimentary economic activitie
by individuals or household groups. The large-scale development o
tourism in Yucatan has been a primary stimuli for such activities
Supplies (threads) and equipment (sewing-machines) are supplied b
non-local interests who are marketing the distribution of these artisan products. There elaboration is essentially a type of cottageindustry or 'putting-out' system of production. Producers receive
only marginal returns for their efforts if income is equated with
labor input. A comparison of average income, calculated in terms o
work-hours, indicates 1.9 pesos per hour for the artisans compared
to 2.9 pesos per hour for henequen producers and 5.4 pesos pe
hour for the fishermen. In all three types of small-scale commercia

activities within Yucatan's peasant sector the authors find that th
articulation of the captialist mode of production has resulted i

mechanisms of production of social classes or a proletarization of
the maya peasantry. They do not go so far as to insist that th
peasant sector no longer exists or represents an important element

in Yucatan, yet they would argue that their evidence leads to the
conclusion that they have been able to identify a transitional phase
towards proletarization.
8. Alice Littlefield, La industria de las hamacas en Yucatdn, M~exico: Estu-
dio de antropologia econd6mica (Mexico, 1976).
Marie Lapointe's Los mayas rebeldes de Yucatdn sh

at least, the intellectual tradition of her Laval Unive
but her focus and approach is distinct. This study w
as her doctoral research in anthropology (Paris, 197
upon historical sources and has been somewhat of a
vestigating archival materials relating to the cruzob
of Quintana Roo in the British Colonial Office and f
diplomatic reports. She also relied upon archival ma
Mexico City and Merida. In addition she made exten
catecan periodical literature and the earlier research
Cline. She focuses upon the nature of relationship
Maya survivors of the mid-19th century "caste war"
ican antagonists and British allies within the con
Mexican relations. Her stress is upon interethnic, so

and political variables before, during, and after the
with Yucatecan and Mexican authorities.
This is an important contribution to both Yucatan anthropological and historical studies in terms of new information and insights.
At the heart of the study is an analysis of the nature of colonialism
in what became Quintana Roo during the post-colonial period of na-
tional Mexican development. The theoretical component, in this

case, is adapted from Henri Favre scemata regarding how colonial-
ism can result in oppression, alienation and insurrection by indigenous sectors. Lapointe is specifically concerned with
determining the extent to which the cruzob (in Maya the plural for
cross and a particular holy cross, hence the Santa Cruz Maya) movement was autonomous or dependent upon outside influences. Not
surprisingly she finds local, contextual, factors-ecological and cultural factors relevant to the tropical forest milieu-stimulating autonomy as well as external factors-the British supply of armaments
and technology-created dependencies.

Lapointe argues that both the National Mexican authorities and
the British had vested interests in prolonging the Maya war with Yu-
catan but for very different reasons. Mexico City officials found it
convenient to have the separatist peninsular political groups preoc-
cupied but unsuccessful in reconquering the Maya-held area, a
strategy which would allow for later Federal intervention and a

greater role in peninsular affairs. On the part of the British, they
were also content to employ a strategy of "benevolent neutrality"
9. Marie Lapointe, "La prolongati6n de la guerra des Castes au Yucatan." Tesis

doctoral del 3er ciclo, (Paris, 1978).
towards the Maya which was repaid by continuing access

resources (dyewoods, lumber) in the area, yet London's
investments in Mexico as a whole and the resulting debt
were too important to be offset by serious English attem
tually incorporate this Mexican territory as part of her
pire. The competing and varied interests of London, Me
and Merida were the external factors involved in the M
Lapointe's interpretation of such factors is both novel and
While other authors have argued that the Yucatan go
had a constant preoccupation with the eastern area cont
the rebel Mayas, Lapointe suggests its preoccupation wa
developing henequen estates. This provided the cruzob t
tunity to develop an internal ideology dominated by
speaking-cross religion and external commercial relation

ish Honduras. These external relations were unequal and
found influence upon sociopolitical developments withi
society. Because of the dependence upon English trade g
armaments, and despite messianic egalitarianism of the M
ogy, individual tribal chiefs with better contacts with
were able to take on the role of regional caudillos. Such
were able to control the egalitarian Maya mode of pr
Lapointe suggests the Maya developed a precapitalist trib

of economy which was, at the same time, egalitarian with
text of the Maya communities and hierarchical in terms
transactions. The Maya attempted to regularize such rela
form of a "respectable annexation" to the British colon
posed annexations, offered by the Maya in 1867 and 1885
jected by London because of cost and because indirect c
the Maya chiefs provided sufficient controls and access
forest products in the Maya zone. When Mexico and Yu
nopoly capitalists offered British interests better terms
London lost interest in supporting the rebel Maya cause.
was a regularization of Mexican boundaries with the Brit
and at least an official agreement to no longer supply a
Maya. These agreements greatly facilitated the Federal
pacification program and the military occupation of th
ritories in 1901. And the Mexico City political price, extr
Merida and Campeche, was the creation of the Federal t
Quintana Roo in 1902.
The contribution of Lapointe's study cannot be underestimated.
Her's is perhaps the first study that links the rebel Maya historical
experience in the second half of the 19th century with regional, national, and international economic and political factors while, at the
same time, is able to show how these factors affect

dynamics within cruzob society. It is an example of
historical sources by an anthropologist and a fruitf
ideas from both disciplines. Her study will be a req
for anyone doing research concerned with the east
Yucatan peninsula in the future.
Nancy Farriss's Maya Society under Colonial Rule
hand, is an example of the fruitful incorporation o
cal insights in historical research. Her most impres
is similar to the bench-mark study of the Valley of Mex
Gibson10 in that its scope, depth, and coverage of p

breaks new ground and at the same time, providing
tive synthesis of the secondary literature. Farriss ca
cal ethnography, which attempts to reconstruct the
as comprehensive a fashion as possible . . . and to tr
that world within the larger colonial context." (p. ix
logical content is the reason why I have included it
And in terms of its organization, the ethnographic
realized in four thematic parts rather than the histor
a chronological approach. This book owes a large deb
tidisciplinary approach begun by the CIW project w
hibiting the degree to which scholarship dealing wi
experience in Yucatan has matured in the past de
author's personal and intimate familiarity with the

sula, and its peoples, adds a sympathetic participantsion to the study.
The book consists of thirteen chapters and include
detailed, scholarly apparatus. Part One (three chapt
the implication of Spanish conquest in terms of May
conquerors' modifications of policy and practice
resulted in two, culturally separate, social and econom

der one colonial regime. Part Two (four chapters) f
social order within colonial society, which is shown
and shifting phenomena affected by the internal dyn
graphic as well as economic, ideological, and politica
Three (four chapters) portrays the adaptive mechanis
vival in terms of class and community structures a
which the Maya incorporated the imposed Christ
order to maintain their own traditions and sense of cosmic order.
The final section, in a summary chapter, provides an analysis of the

10. Charles Gibson, The Aztecs Under Spanish Rule: A History of Indians of
the Valley ofMexico, 1519-1810 (Stanford, 1964).
late colonial Bourbon reforms and their far-reaching impac

fect the establishment of a new-colonial Maya. What is of
lar interest for the reader, regardless of disciplinary affili
Farriss' intention to view the Maya experience as an active
namic part of the colonial equation rather than the more tr
treatment of indigenous passivity and despondence.
The success of this book, which represents the cumulat
one and a half decades of academic interest in things Maya
be divorced from the non-history disciplinary association
author. Nancy Farriss has not only done her archival hom
the most diligent manner, she has also excavated with the a
ogists, consulted with the linguists, conferenced with the s
cultural anthropologists, and she has listened to the descen
the colonial Maya and their European conquerors. This inte
experience has allowed her to understand, with conside
sight, the dynamics of interaction between differing and distan
tural phenomena. Within anthropology, a few decades ago

suggested that anthropology would eventually become histo
would become nothing. This book suggests a very different
ment insofar as history appears to be moving towards anth
in its search for relevant frames of interpretation and anal
what this development indicates, something that those of
work in both disciplines have been insisting for some tim
that it is not a particular discipline or its methodology, rat
the type of questions asked that provide the basis for find
factory answers.
Farriss' search for relevant questions and answers prov
stimulating intellectual under-current of her book. In deali
questions of colonial Spanish-Maya economic relations and
tion modes, with the hardening of class differences, the c
patterns of demographic decline or increase, or religiou
views and ritual there is a conscious effort made to understand the
process involved rather than being satisfied in describing historical

events. Throughout the text Farriss will shift her discussion from the
colonial period to more contemporary debate about how a colonial

society functions. In so doing she frequently moves to post-colonial
and modern periods as reference points. Although she avoids the
conventional anthropological terminology applied to economic systems, for example, her discussion of the issues clearly indicates she
is fully conversant with them. This approach results in a book that
will be of interest for readers in any of the social science disciplines
as it deals both with the specifics of her case and the nature of the
historical phenomena it represents.
The central thesis of the book is that in Yucatan, due to the ab-
sence of precious metals and the economic viability for large-scale

estate agriculture, policies were adopted by crown and colonists to
maximize advantages for exploiting of Maya labor within local traditional production modes. Thus tribute and labor (domestic, personal
and agrarian) became the primary resources for the Spanish settlers
in the area. And the most efficient means of harnessing these
resources was through social and political institutions already firmly
established. This resulted in the survival of the Maya "world"
despite its forced attachment to Spain's colonial empire. Even the

Franciscan missionary presence, by virtue of its economic reliance
upon the same system, was only able to achieve a superficial conversion of the regional populations. This did not mean that new
forms of community organization (cofradias, cajas de communidad) and ritual practice were not achieved, rather that the
more traditional ones could find space for continuance within the
colonial regime. The Maya were able to maintain their household
and field rituals while also engaging in public and formal ritual introduced by the clerics. And when the clerics eventually left the
rural Maya communities what remained was a continuance of forms
that the Maya adapted to serve their needs. The Maya were active
and innovative participants in the colonial process.
The two-world dichotomy, as portrayed by Farriss, encouraged
the maintenance of corporate social and political distinctions. In Yucatan the ideas enshrined in royal legislation about the necessity to
preserve repablicas de indios became very much of a reality. Access
to the Spanish social and political world remained a tenuous proposition. The Maya nobility, or cacique class, remained barred from entry on terms advantageous for this Maya class. In contrast to the
experience of Aztec nobility in the central highlands which, at least
partially, managed a degree of integration through intermarriage, the
lowland Maya nobility remained on the outside, as intermediary

agents for the encomenderos, governmental and ecclesiastical offi-
cials. The available options for individuals who might choose to

penetrate the settler society was without status of significance. For
the Maya commoner life within the rural communities, as well, had
a more acceptable social and ideological meaning. For them entry
in the settler world was, and remained, a matter of servile labor
(domestic, personal). In effect, the maintenance of the two worlds
served the interests of both despite the shifts and changes through
time in the social fabric of the colonial whole.
Farriss' treatment also revises the more conventional ideas about
the breakdown of the colonial patterns in Yucatan, usually linked

to the emergence of capitalism and the henequen estates, in the
second half of the 19th century after the 'caste war.' She
the system broke down as a result of the Bourbon refo
late 18th-century imperial administrative readjustmen
reaching consequences in Yucatan. On the one hand, th
tion of trade policies opened up markets for regional pro
stuffs, hides, hard fibers) in the larger region, part
Caribbean, giving a stimulus for the development of lar

estates or the hacienda formation seen much earlier in the Mexican
highlands. At the same time royal treasury shortfalls resulted in state
cooptation of Maya community financial structures (cajas de communidad, cofradias). The result was land alienation and encroachment by Yucatecans in order to create their estates and a weakening
of Maya community resources and defenses. Very soon the Maya lost
control over town councils, their repUiJblicas de indios were

abolished and they were unable to halt the take-over of their lands
and the appropriation of their labor. The 95 percent population in-
crease between 1774 and 1794 also intensified the process. This
'reconquest,' as Farriss calls it, was the process which saw a violent
Maya reaction in the form of the 'caste war' in the mid 19th century.
At the same time it was the initial stage of the development of an ex-
port economy culminating in the henequen 'green gold' era during

and after the porfiriato.
Farriss sees the colonial developments in lowland Yucatan as
later but fundamentally parallel to what took place in the heartland

of New Spain. Her skillful combination of analysis of local, regional,
as well as international economic trends adds a most welcome perspective to our understanding of Yucatan society. This same feature
also characterizes the works of Lapointe, and Breton and Labrecque,
although it is largely absent in the works of Hansen and Kirk. Collectively the five books do represent research activity covering prac-
tically all areas and the periods of the Yucatan peninsula since
conquest. The larger historical dimension, seen as an integral factor

for the study of a specific region, even one as isolated as Yucatan,
has become an integral feature of recent anthropological research
about Yucatan. Ignoring such factors, one of the long-standing criticism of Redfield's pioneering work and still seen in the work of
some scholars, may provide useful data but less than satisfactory
bases for interpreting basic processes at work in Yucatecan society.
The recent studies included in this essay and they were chosen
as a representative sample only-no exhaustive review of all recent
works has been attempted-indicate a growing convergence of

historical and anthropological approaches. This process was initiated by the CIW research project and will undoubtedly continue
in the future. Having made this observation, however, I must add
a caveat, to the extent that it applies primarily t

scholarship. In Mexico, the prima facie evidence b
of the National Institute of Anthropology and Hi
vision of disciplinary approaches really ever exis
ence to Mexican and Yucatecan anthropological research about
Yucatan, one finds a rather limited participation compared to the
published works of non-national scholars. That such studies are increasingly being published in Mexico and in Spanish also represents
a trend of sorts. Most of the CIW research results appeared in print
in English and in the USA. Villa Rojas' ethnography of the Quintana
Roo Maya (The Maya of East Central Quintana Roo, CIW, 1945),
for example, only appeared in Mexico in 1979 as Los elegidos de
Dios, INI)."I As an ethnographic study it remains unsurpassed
although the study of Miguel A. Bartolome and Alicia M. Barabas (La
resistencia Maya: relaciones interitnicas en el oriente de la peninsula de Yucatdn, SEP/INAH, 1977) provides a more comprehensive
eontextual analysis. This book and Lapointe's study compliment

each other in their respective concentration of internal and external factors. These being the research results of two Argentines and
one Canadian the question emerges, where are the Yucatecan scholars, or that new generation of local anthropologists without direct
links to the CIW research epoch? To provide an answer here would
extend this essay beyond the toleration of the publishers of this jour-
nal. They are, in fact, "en elproceso deformaci6n, "12 and they will
be definitely heard from within the coming decade.
11. Alfonso Villa Rojas, Los Elegidos de Dios: Etnografia de los Mayas de Quintana Roo, (Mexico, 1978).
12. An increasing number of graduates of la Escuela de Ciencias Anthropol6gicas de la Universidad de Yucatin are completing graduate studies in Mexico City and
internationally. Their research results will become increasingly important in the
future.

Antropological Studies in Yucatan

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University of California Institute for Mexico and the United States

Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico

Anthropological Studies in Yucatan

L'agriculture, la peche et I'artisanat au Yucatan: Proletarisation

Labrecque. (Quebec: les presses de L'Universite Laval, 1981).

Maya Society Under Colonial Rule: The Collective Enterprise of Sur

Mdrida; Su transformaci6n: de capital colonial a naciente metropoli

Haciendas en Yucatan, Mexico. By Carlos R. Kirk. (Mexico: Instituto

The Mayan cultural tradition in the Yucatan peninsula has long

164 Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos

national state. As well, both areas have relatively wea

placing these studies and anthropological research a

into historical perspective. In a real sense this work is

1930s Carnegie Institution of Washington (CIW) sp

Robert Redfield directed program of regional researc

ogy and a rediscovery of the ancient Maya past. After alm

cades of archaeological effort the CIW Department

Research, which was responsible for the research activ

thropology) but also history, botany, medicin

geography-in effect a multi-disciplinary and compreh

Michigan, New Mexico) and specialists were being a

1. An excellent background as well as details about on-going C

3. Robert Redfield, The Folk Culture of Yucatan (Chicago,

Konrad: Anthropological Studies 165

field's perceived rural-urban continuum. The Hansens arrived in

sity of Miami (Ohio) and the University of Alabama. Redfield's

Benjamin Paul, Ricardo Posas Arciniegas, Juan Rosales, William

he returned to Merida and with the sponsorship of the Merida

graph and to produce a second volume which would bring the

second volume fails to become a reality as is most likely-and a

strength, since it provides the reader with a historical document

166 Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos

And, as will be indicated in my review of the othe

context, with historical, demographic, geographical data on

second section, (Chapters 8-16), on the other hand, is of much

which shattered the oligarchic domination of the henequen

The key factors in transforming Merida from its colonial patter

of urban core, dominated by the traditional elite in control of

economic ones. The city he found in the 1930s, and contrar

of urban sociology-had taught him, was much more tradit

than industrial. It still had the basic physical configuration of a

dustrial urban pattern, with its central business core, sate

commercial enclaves, suburban residential areas, and a breakdo

Konrad: Anthropological Studies 167

palatial residences along the Paseo de Montejo. Yet by 1

central core area. As a metropolitan center Merida,

The data on class structure, ideology, dress patterns, domestic

found to be more traditional than proposed-and concluded-by

is, its importance for contemporary anthropology is greatly

Kirk's Haciendas in Yucatan concentrates upon the key factor

168 Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos

a doctoral research thesis, one of a number that gre

The legacy of the CIW project in Yucatan is evident in the for-

mulation and publication of this study. On the one hand, th

rator. In a real sense, the CIW's early incorporation of Mexica

ing research access became established, particularly for North

thropological publication series,6 have published many of th

in making available in Mexico, and in Spanish, the products o

research in Mexico; representing a counter-tendency to the practic

tation it provides a considerable body of quantitative data o

Hammock Industry in Yucatan, Mexico: A Study in Economic Anthropology," (Mich

6. INI's Serie de Antropologia Social began in 1963, and by 1982 published

Konrad: Anthropological Studies 169

production, income, expenses, kin and ritual relation