Yucatan caste

[Raveen Satkurunathan]

On Tue, 13 Feb 2001 13:46:28 -0600, Benjamin Preciado <bprecia at COLMEX.MX>
wrote:

>The Maya did not have any caste system. The New Spain society was divided
in
>castes by the europeans and this system was not taken from indigenous
>peoples. It was applied all over the territory and not only in Yucatan. It
>was based on race lines and the europeans had the highest ranking,
>indigenous peoples, african slaves and all the posible intermarriage
descent
>coming in the lower rankings.
>The indian revolt of Yucatan in the mid XIX century was called the Caste
War
>because this division of society was still remembered then.
>Benjamin Preciado

Dear Dr. Preciado,

While agreeing that the Spanish colonialists did introduce a Caste like
system in Latin America, we should still keep in mind that the indigenous
societies of what is today Latin America did have a societies divided along
class, mostly hereditary. I think what Dr. Ganesan is trying to find out is
the about the concept of pollution with respect to the kinds of jobs they
did (by birth) in determining their position in pre-Spanish indigenous
societies specifically with respect to the many Maya groups. I am pretty
sure that there should be relevant literature in this field. Anthropology
journals dedicated to Latin American pre-colonial societies should be of
some help. Thanks

Raveen