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History debates - Roger Chartier

"It seemed to me that the Collège de France website, a magnificent tool for the transmission of knowledge, could, or should, take on the task of providing a forum for discussion of the latest research. Under the title "Débats d'histoire" and, for the time being, within the framework of my Chair in Writing and Cultures in Modern Europe, these exchanges, based on recent publications, will make known works that deepen our knowledge of the past and transform our ways of thinking, writing or reading history. These will not be lectures or seminars recorded for remote access, but - as in a radio program - conversations between researchers on the new perspectives opened up by original and daring research. At the beginning of each month, a new "history debate" will be posted on the Collège website

Roger Chartier - Professor at the Collège de France, Chair of Writing and Cultures in Modern Europe

First broadcast

A witchcraft trial in Manila in 1577

This first conversation in the "Débats d'histoire" series is devoted to Romain Bertrand's book Le long remords de la Conquête. Manila-Mexico-Madrid. L'affaire Diego de Avila (1577-1580) (Seuil, 2015). Its starting point is the trial of an eleven-year-old child and two native women, accused of witchcraft, by the Governor of Manila. Exceptional in many respects, this trial provides an insight into several profound realities: the conflicts between the new administrators and the veterans of the Conquest, the role of the missionary orders and the remorse of the conquistadors, or the encounter between the Indian servants and the judges who subjected them to torture. The presentation of this book, in the company of Patrick Boucheron, will examine how the combination of a micro-historical approach and a connected history project enables a fresh look at Spanish colonization and the encounter between the words of the conquerors and the silences of the colonized.