Topic 3: Encountering the "Other"

In previous posts I asked you to think about how do we “do history” when records have been destroyed and how we can use myth and legend in our analysis.  In this post I want you to consider the question of the “other.” What happens when people who encounter each other are from vastly different cultures, speak different languages, and worship different gods?  How will these cultures understand, and misunderstand, each other?

Modern Examples

Cultural misunderstandings are still common place even in our global world.  Take, for example, the relatively mundane exchanges in international business. Americans think “time is money” and want to get right down to doing business immediately, typically on a first name and very informal basis.  East Asians believe in a ritual exchange of greetings (including business cards), a period of social pleasantries, and are more formal in exchange.  Do you think these cultural differences matter? Does confusion arise from misunderstandings even among business executives who are using the same “global capitalist” playbook and who likely can communicate with each other in the same language, or have excellent interpreters standing by.

Taken from The Telegraph article linked below

Here is an interesting article about where things can go wrong with the Anglophone countries
The Telegraph, "Business etiquette: the importance of cultural sensitivity"

Here is an interesting take on American culture and etiquette from a British perspective.  It is always interesting to read how others describe your country and culture. 
USA - Language, Culture, Customs and Etiquette

The "Other" in 1502 - Columbus and the Mayas

Now imagine the encounters of people who do not play by the same book, who have a cosmosvision completely alien to each other, and where there may be no interpreter to foster communication.  How will these encounters go?  What misunderstandings will there be? And what will be the fallout from these misunderstandings?

To illustrate my point, let’s look at the first meeting between the Mayas and Europeans. In June 1502, a Maya seaborne trading expedition came across the fleet of Christopher Columbus (during his fourth voyage) near the Bay Islands off of Honduran coast. Hernando Columbus, son of the Admiral, left an account of this meeting: 

by good fortune there arrived at that time a canoe long as a galley and eight feet wide… freighted with merchandise…. Amidships it had a palm‑leaf awning like that which the Venetian gondolas carry; this gave complete protection against the rain and waves. Under this awning were the children and women and all the baggage and merchandise. There were twenty‑five paddlers aboard, but they offered no resistance when our boats drew up to them.

    

Our men brought the canoe alongside the flagship, where the Admiral gave thanks to God for revealing to him in a single moment, without any toil or danger to our people, all the products of that country. He took aboard the costliest and handsomest things in that cargo: 

cotton mantles and sleeveless shirts embroidered and painted in different designs and colors; breechclouts of the same design and cloth as the shawls worn by the women in the canoe, being like the shawls worn by the Moorish women of Granada; long wooden swords with a groove on each side where the edge should be, in which were fastened with cord and pitch, flint knives that

cut like steel; hatchets resembling the stone hatchets used by the other Indians, but made of good copper; and hawk's bells of copper, and crucibles to melt it. For provisions they had such roots and grains as the Indians of Española eat, also a wine made of maize that tasted like English beer. They had as well many of the almonds which the Indians of New Spain use as currency; and these the Indians in the canoe valued greatly, for I noticed that when they were brought aboard with the other goods, and some fell to the floor, all the Indians squatted down to pick them up as

if they had lost something of great value‑‑their greed driving out their feelings of terror and danger at finding themselves in the hands of such strange and ferocious men as we must have seemed to be.... 

The Admiral was so impressed ... that he ordered his people to treat them well, and gave them some trading truck in exchange for what our men had taken from them.  He detained only one, an ancient named Yumbé, who seemed to be the wisest man among them and of greatest authority, to inform him about the secrets of that land and to persuade the others to talk to the Christians; he served us very willingly and loyally all the time we were in the region where his speech was

understood.  Having come to the limits of the area in which his language was spoken, the Admiral gave him some presents and sent him home very satisfied.   The find of that canoe and its contents made the Admiral aware of the great wealth, civilization, and industry of the peoples.

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Although this encounter was brief, each side gleaned important knowledge (and misunderstandings) of the other.  For the Spaniards it was evidence that a civilization of interest lay somewhere along the coast.  Undoubtedly, the Maya merchant Yumbé, who was likely a Maya elite, since they controlled the trade, was doing some reconnoitering of his own.  Since Maya elites controlled trade and organized trading expeditions, he was likely the most senior leader and felt it his duty to find out all he could about the strangers and report this information to his king.   Considering that this first encounter was peaceful, the Spaniards traded for items they took, and they released a seemingly willing Yumbé after his short stay on board, it is likely that the Mayas could initially consider the Spaniards to be appealing trading partners for new exotics and prestige items. The most interesting action within this narrative is the spilling of “almonds” and the reactions of the Mayas to quickly gather them up before they could go overboard. The Spaniards gawked at this chasing after of some beans, “as if they had lost something of great value.” These were cacao beans and were of great value, since they were the currency of Mesoamerica.  How would the Spaniards have reacted if gold coins have been scattered and were rolling toward the edge of the deck?  And Mesoamericans are going to openly wonder about the Spaniards’ sickness for gold.  Remember, as we move forward in class, that there will be many misunderstandings and cultural differences in the early days of the Spanish empire.  Over time a new culture forged from elements of all three regions (America, Europe, and Africa) will develop as these peoples learn about and interact with each other. 

NOTE: A Spanish caravel would have been wider and ride higher on the water.  A Maya sea-trading canoe would have been longer and narrower about a third of the beam of the caravel.  Each had a similar ship's complement and cargo capacity. Both were perfectly seaworthy.

Thinking Historically: Glance through this sociology website on the concept of the other: What is otherness?  As you read through the materials in Topic 3 and the next two units, try to put yourself into the position of "the other" and pay attention not only to what we historians today posit in our analysis, but also analyze what people in the 16th and 17th centuries were saying and thinking about each other.  Think about the long process of getting to know the other, of making pragmatic choices as societies merge.  How much "otherness" remains?

1. Fernando Columbus’ account of the 4th voyage.  From Life of the Admiral Christopher Columbus by his Son Ferdinand, translated and edited by Benjamin Keen (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers Univ. Press, 1959), 231-33.

2. Image of Columbus: "Portrait of a Man, Said to be Christopher Columbus" by Sebastiano del Piombo - Metropolitan Museum of Art, online collection. Licensed under Public Domain via Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Portrait_of_a_Man,_Said_to_be_Christopher_Columbus.jpg#/media/File:Portrait_of_a_Man,_Said_to_be_Christopher_Columbus.jpg

3. Maya Canoe from Chichen Itza mural: http://www.angelfire.com/art/nativeherb/chichen-mural.gif

4. Replica of Spanish caravel: http://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/2d42e3d51377640b4c5a1c5238608d8404a47242/c=4-0-2000-1500&r=x404&c=534x401/local/-/media/WLTX/WLTX/2014/04/18//1397826403000-835979.jpg

5. Cacao beans: https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQk7aWa1ERSFdNwZRuio9MetcyOiTpaZO9ogAZnN2WFsKPH4g0-

6. Maya Merchant: http://www.authenticmaya.com/images/merchant_small1.jpg