Before Columbus, the Americas were populated by many indigenous
cultures, with a great diversity of religions. After 1492, European
governments and churches dominated religious life. While Roman
Catholicism was the official religion, great religious
hybridization occurred, mixing European, indigenous, and often
African traditions into distinctly New World forms.
Latin American Religions provides an introduction through
documents to the historical development and contemporary
expressions of religious life in South and Central America, Mexico,
and the Spanish-speaking Caribbean. A central feature of this text
is its inclusion of both primary and secondary materials, including
letters, sermons, journal entries, ritual manuals, and ancient
sacred texts. These documents provide readers with direct access to
the voices of adherents, enabling them to act as academic
investigators, experiencing and interpreting the same texts on
which historians draw. The documents are framed by substantive
introductions which provide both historical context and theoretical
insights for the study of these religions traditions and the ways
in which they have developed over time.
From the religious traditions of the Mayas and Aztecs and of the
African diaspora, to official and popular Catholicism, to
liberation theology, the rise of Pentecostalism, and emerging
trends and new religious movements in Latin America, this new work
offers a concise overview of this fascinating field.
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