Honor in Latin America, to 1900 (Latin American Studies)

Introduction

Honor was a value system that governed the lives of colonial and early national Latin Americans. It structured the interactions between elites and plebeians and also gender relations. Honor had two fundamental aspects: first, honor or the status with which a person was born; second, honra or the virtues that imparted respect to an individual. The first aspect was tied up with nobility but also was associated with wealth and the kind of lifestyle that insulated individuals from blemishes to their reputation. In order to maintain this honorable status, such families needed to be able to trace their genealogy to ancestors who were old Christians, free of any accusations before the Inquisition, without any associations with manual or dirty occupations, and to have been born in wedlock. Elite families proved their honorable lineages with documents called limpieza de sangre, which attested to blood that was clean of any stains on their honor. The members of families of wealth and status were considered honorable by association but, in theory, bad behavior could cause a loss of honor. Others, less lucky in their family origins, had to acquire honor by virtue, including bravery, honesty, and morality. Both men and women were also supposed to respect rules of sexual morality, but there was a double standard. Women were supposed to be chaste—virgins at marriage and then faithful wives and sober widows, whereas men were rarely admonished for their sexual conquests. Honor was a way of ranking people; its framework guided interactions and the submission or dominance displayed within social situations. First studied by anthropologists of the Mediterranean world, initially honor was associated with the elites and was thought to be a male attribute. More recently, scholars have shown that many of the groups thought to be excluded from honor systems, such as the lower classes, enslaved peoples, and women, actually had strong senses of their personal honor. In addition, scholars have shown that disgrace and shame could be corrected through bureaucratic machinations and with community approval. Thus, honor was a much more pliable attribute than previously thought. In addition, although honor was initially associated with old regime societies, it evolved in the 19th and 20th centuries to become associated with citizenship.

Theory and Background

Honor was first identified as an important construct by 1960s anthropologists studying the Mediterranean region. Caro Baroja 1966, Peristiany and Pitt-Rivers 1992, and Pitt-Rivers 1977 all were written by pioneers in this field, and their work helped codify how scholars now perceive the place of honor in Mediterranean societies. Primarily, they researched rural societies in which hierarchies played out in simple and harsh manners. Their work provides an important starting point and was taken up and expanded on by historians of Spain, such as in Maravall 1989 (first published in 1979). These authors provide a framework by which honor was explored and amplified as a theoretical construct by scholars of other regions and temporalities. Bourdieu 2002 (first published in 1977) builds on those early works and develops a more theoretically rich view of honor that has become hugely influential not just in honor studies but in other fields such as material history. Taylor 2008 indirectly critiques some of the early work on honor that depended partly on legal codes but especially on the period literature to develop a picture of what honor meant to contemporaries. Using judicial archives, the author shows that the way that honor was lived in golden age Spain did not replicate the plays and dramas of its authors, and Scott Taylor provides an important corrective to the reliance on such sources.

Bourdieu, Pierre. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice. Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology 16. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
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Seminal work that provides theoretical constructs for the symbolic nature of many aspects of honor. Drawing on fieldwork in Algeria, offers concrete examples of the interactions that animate honor. It has shaped the thinking of many scholars of the topic.
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Caro Baroja, Julio. La ciudad y el campo. Hombre, Hechos e Ideas 5. Madrid: Alfaguara, 1966.
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A compilation of previous works, with one section on honor and shame in Spanish history, which elucidates the etymology and categories within Mediterranean culture and history. A fundamental source for the intricacies of thinking within Spanish law and literature.
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Maravall, José Antonio. Poder, honor y élites en el siglo XVII. 3d ed. Historia. Madrid: Siglo Veintiuno de España Editores, 1989.
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This book clarifies the role of honor as one of the principal axes of Spanish society, with emphasis on the ways that it shaped the nobility and the preoccupation with lineage. Very dependent on period literature for its evidence.
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Peristiany, J. G., and Julian Pitt-Rivers, eds. Honor and Grace in Anthropology. Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology 76. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
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Bringing together some earlier work with a reconsideration of honor, this collection distills the thinking on honor from the pioneering scholars and some of its theoreticians, bringing together the major early thinkers on Mediterranean honor.
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Pitt-Rivers, Julian. The Fate of Shechem, or, The Politics of Sex: Essays in the Anthropology of the Mediterranean. Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology 19. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1977.
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A fundamental study of Andalusian rural society that distilled the interactions of contemporaries within the framework of age-old constructs. Covering topics such as the family, hospitality, and women, this book was formative for the field.
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Taylor, Scott K. Honor and Violence in Golden Age Spain. Derecho. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008.
DOI: 10.12987/yale/9780300126853.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This book dispels the idea that celebrated plays showed honor as people lived it. It also introduces the notion of a rhetoric rather than a code of honor and provides a very rich discussion of male interactions of the period.
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Precolonial Latin America

Although honor is most commonly associated with Mediterranean cultures and thus for Latin America, its study starts with colonialism, but its structuring ideas were also present in early cultures. Thus, scholars investigating particularly the Aztecs have sometimes alluded to ideas of honor, yet studies that directly associate honor with indigenous peoples are rare. Thouvenot and Romero Galván 2008 argues that concepts equivalent to honor existed among the Aztecs.

Thouvenot, Marc, and José Rubén Romero Galván. “Fama, honra y renombre entre los nahuas.” Estudios de Cultura Náhuatl 39 (2008): 51–64.
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A rare look at the way that concepts equivalent to honor were present among Nahua peoples. Using both the exhortations of elders and a fine analysis of vocabulary, the authors show the importance of fame and renown.
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Colonial Latin America

Building on the anthropology of honor from the Mediterranean, historians began to flesh out how this framework functioned in a colonial setting in which many races and cultures lived within the same setting. Works such as Gutiérrez 1991 insert indigenous peoples into the honor framework and also, somewhat controversially, emphasize how indigenous sexualities were in contradiction to this code. This book, however, was hugely influential and led to many more studies. Martin 1996 expands on this early view of northern Mexican communities, and, with its more finely drawn analysis (particularly of insults and the ways that hierarchy was played out in daily life), the author provides the impetus for such studies as Castro Gutiérrez 2000. Both these books were fundamental in sparking interest in honor studies for colonial Latin America and led to the anthology The Faces of Honor (Johnson and Lipsett-Rivera 1998), which brought together many distinguished historians and began to dispute many of the tenets of the Mediterranean school of honor studies. Within this volume, scholars argue that plebeians were as honor-bound as the elites and also claimed honor for slaves. This volume took the study of honor out of the realm of law and literature and into the more prosaic lived experiences of the people, also showing that honor was not as brittle a concept as had been advanced. Undurraga Schüler 2012 is the latest in this exploration of the operationalization of honor in colonial societies but adds a fine categorization of the types of honor and the ways that mostly men deployed many types of strategies to maintain their status. Pardo 2015 changes the focus to the contact period during which missionaries guided indigenous peoples and introduced them to new values such as honor.

Castro Gutiérrez, Felipe. “Honor y deshonor en una ciudad provinciana: La curiosa vida y escandalosas acciones de Agustín Moreno de Nava.” Estudios de Historia Novohispana 23 (2000): 47–66.
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Centering on a village rogue, this article explores the conduct that led to his dishonor, and argues that such values were important among those who did not belong to colonial elites.
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Gutiérrez, Ramón A. When Jesus Came, the Corn Mothers Went Away: Marriage, Sexuality, and Power in New Mexico, 1500–1846. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1991.
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A study of marriage patterns and sexual relationships as affected by the conquest, this book illuminates the role of the clergy in negotiating between honor and status of the Spanish conquerors and the native population.
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Johnson, Lyman L., and Sonya Lipsett-Rivera, eds. The Faces of Honor: Sex, Shame and Violence in Colonial Latin America. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1998.
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Very influential anthology that established that honor was not just an elite concept but was adopted by plebeians, women and slaves and opened the way for many other studies providing innovative approaches to the study of honor.
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Martin, Cheryl English. Governance and Society in Colonial Mexico: Chihuahua in the Eighteenth Century. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996.
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A study of the relationships between social groups in northern Mexico, this book explores how insults and other types of interactions contributed to construct social identity and reputation within the framework of honor.
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Pardo, Osvaldo F. Honor and Personhood in Early Modern Mexico. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2015.
DOI: 10.3998/mpub.7653137Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Focusing on the way that clerics guided indigenous peoples after contact, this book surveys how values around possessions, insults and restitution, truth and oaths, and punishments were vectors for the inculcation of new values.
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Undurraga Schüler, Verónica. Los rostros del honor: Normas culturales y estrategias de promoción social en Chile colonial, siglo XVIII. Estudios Históricos 62. Santiago, Chile: DIBAM, 2012.
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An exploration of male interactions with honor at the center, this monograph provides one of the best breakdowns of the different types of honor. It provides comprehensive information about insults and the spatial settings for dealings over honor.
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19th-Century Latin America

As colonies became nations, the population adapted while many of the values associated with their former status began to change. One theme of many of the early studies of this period, under the rubric of honor studies, was an examination of how the greater violence affected gendered conceptions of honor. Alonso 1995 is a pioneering study that examines the expanding masculinity in the frontier regions of northern Mexico. The author’s analysis showed how men’s violence became a defining attribute for their honor. Santos 2012 follows in this line of inquiry for poor men in Brazil, with a strong gender and theoretical framework. Chambers 1999 is one of the first studies of the process of moving from subject to citizen, showing how men’s honor was enhanced by their role as soldiers, whereas women’s honor was diminished because their social roles were less valued. Zahler 2013 also follows this line of inquiry, examining changing legal constructs and the way they intersected with values. Caulfield, et al. 2005 brings together many authors who were beginning to explore the new constructions of honor within the nations of Latin America. Beattie 2001 expands the examination of the early connection made in Chambers 1999 linking honor and soldiering, by looking at how honor was deployed within the ranks of the Brazilian military. The emphasis of Piccato 2010 differs from these other studies; instead of violence and soldiers, it focuses on the political world, perhaps opening up a new area of inquiry.

Alonso, Ana María. Thread of Blood: Colonialism, Revolution & Gender on Mexico’s Northern Frontier. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1995.
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This study of the northern frontier explores the violence that was at the root of the construction of honor for men as soldiers and for the women who were very often the victims of this aggression.
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Beattie, Peter M. The Tribute of Blood: Army, Honor, Race, and Nation in Brazil, 1864–1945. Latin America Otherwise. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001.
DOI: 10.1215/9780822381105Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This book is an examination of the ways that military policies brought together different races and classes and how the dynamics of these encounters in the army were governed partially by concepts of honor.
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Caulfield, Sueann, Sarah C. Chambers, and Lara Putnam, eds. Honor, Status, and Law in Modern Latin America. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005.
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This collection of essays brought the study of honor into the 19th and 20th centuries and dealt with the issues of citizenship and honor, slavery, and morality crimes. It also continued the trend of situating honor among plebeians.
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Chambers, Sarah C. From Subjects to Citizens: Honor, Gender, and Politics in Arequipa, Peru, 1780–1854. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1999.
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An important study of the ways that honor changed from the late colonial to early national periods, and also the ways that citizenship became enmeshed with honor. Gender analysis provides a view of the differing fates of male and female honor.
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Piccato, Pablo. The Tyranny of Opinion: Honor in the Construction of the Mexican Public Sphere. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010.
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This study shows the importance of reputation and self-worth in Mexican politics and public culture, and how honor became a touchstone for authority. It traces the evolution of concepts of honor over the course of the 19th century.
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Santos, Martha S. Cleansing Honor with Blood: Masculinity, Violence, and Power in the Backlands of Northeast Brazil, 1845–1889. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012.
DOI: 10.11126/stanford/9780804774567.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An examination of violence between poor but free men in the Brazilian hinterlands, and how honor animated and framed the struggle for status and manhood.
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Zahler, Reuben. Ambitious Rebels: Remaking Honor, Law, and Liberalism in Venezuela, 1780–1850. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2013.
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An exploration of the ways in which legal doctrines and honor intersect in the transition from colony to nation, this study examines the way that citizenship changed honor for lower classes and women.
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Duels and Insults

The etiquette and ritualized deference within honor systems could be inverted in order to insult. Individuals followed certain formulas both to tarnish others and to try to repair such insults. Lipsett-Rivera 1998 analyzes insults within a gender framework but also connects them to bodily acts. Following on this exploration, Clissa de Mendiolaza 2005 and Salomón Pérez 2008 provide more-legalistic views of how insults were dealt with in the colonial period. Starting in the 19th century, elite men began to use formal duels to repair insults. Previously, men often used violence to repair insults, but as Undurraga Schüler 2008 shows, it was not within the framework of a duel. Parker 2001 documents the emergence of the duel in Latin America and the legal response to the practice, but Gayol 2008 provides the most comprehensive study of the phenomenon. Kiddle 2015 extends this construct to the world of diplomacy and shows the continuity of the culture of honor across time and within other settings.

Clissa de Mendiolaza, Karina. “Imágenes de honor mancillado en Córdoba del Tucumán, 1750–1797.” Colonial Latin American Historical Review 14.3 (2005): 245–280.
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This article explores legal doctrines that defined insults and calumnies and the elements that constituted them, including impersonation, public documents, and gestures, and provides an analysis of nineteen cases.
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Gayol, Sandra. Honor y duelo en la Argentina moderna. Colección Historia y Cultura. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Siglo Veintiuno Editores, 2008.
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The most complete study of duels in 19th-century Latin America, this book explores the codification of encounters as well as the importance of newspapers as a medium for insults and challenges.
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Kiddle, Amelia M. “In Mexico’s Defense: Dueling, Diplomacy, Gender and Honor, 1876–1940.” Mexican Studies / Estudios Mexicanos 31.1 (2015): 22–47.
DOI: 10.1525/msem.2015.31.1.22Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article brings the issue of duels over insults to male honor into the early 20th century and the world of diplomacy. It explores an international culture of honor, complete with codes that guided diplomats’ conduct in foreign settings.
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Lipsett-Rivera, Sonya. “De obra y de palabra: Patterns of Insults in Mexico, 1750–1856.” The Americas 54.4 (1998): 511–539.
DOI: 10.2307/1007773Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An analysis of insults both in words and physical gestures, this article shows how honor could be offended in numerous manners.
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Parker, David S. “Law, Honor, and Impunity in Spanish America: The Debate over Dueling, 1870–1920.” Law and History Review 19.2 (2001): 311–341.
DOI: 10.2307/744132Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An exploration of the culture of duels in late-19th-century Buenos Aires and the fight to prohibit this practice despite a culture of silence among participants. It shows the contradictions between the culture of honor and opposition to duels.
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Salomón Pérez, Rodrigo. “Porque palabras duelen más que puñadas: La injuria en Nueva España, siglos XVI y XVI.” Fronteras de la Historia 13.2 (2008): 353–374.
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This article provides an analysis of different phases of insults, with an emphasis on settings and efficacy. Apart from an overview of legal structures and definitions, it also explores the elements of noise, voice tones, and crowds.
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Undurraga Schüler, Verónica. “Cuando las afrentas se lavaban con sangre: Honor, masculinidad y duelos de espadas en el siglo XVIII chileno.” Historia (Chile) 41.1 (2008): 165–188.
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In 1752, lowly French expatriates engaged in a sword fight with Chileans over their honor. The subsequent lawsuit provides insights into the masculine values of plebeian men and the ways it operated on a daily basis.
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Sexuality and Illegitimacy

Traditional constructs of honor emphasized the restrictions of female sexuality. According to such ideas, the loss of virginity or chastity could not be repaired. Seed 1988 examines marriage choice and ideas about love, showing that young men and women used ecclesiastical courts, when possible, to make love matches. In the 18th century, new parental rights allowed for blocking such matches when relatives considered them to be between men and women of unequal standing. Later studies such as Mannarelli 2007, Sloan 2008, and von Germeten 2013 ascribe considerably more agency to women and a greater level of comfort to breaking the rules around chastity. These studies provide evidence that women were much freer regarding their sexual lives than was presented in the literature. In her prize-winning study, Ann Twinam (Twinam 1999) shows how illegitimacy could be overcome through bureaucratic fiat, and, at the same time, documents many of the ways (and reasons why) that men and women, even of the supposedly rigidly moral elite families, engaged in premarital relations. Ruggiero 1992 illustrates a different, more repentant womanhood in the 19th century; in her article the author documents cases in which women tried to repair their honor by killing their newborns.

Mannarelli, María Emma. Private Passions and Public Sins: Men and Women in Seventeenth-Century Lima. Translated by Sidney Evans and Meredith D. Dodge. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2007.
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This classic study examines the ways that colonial Peruvians flouted the honor standards for sexuality in multiple manners. It also deals with the problems faced by illegitimate children and their parents.
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Robins, Nicholas A. Of Love and Loathing: Marital Life, Strife, and Intimacy in the Colonial Andes, 1750–1825. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2015.
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Building on previous literature, this book explores the difference between rules and social practice within gender relations. Honor provides a framework for discussions of illicit relationships, elopements, domestic violence, and rape.
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Ruggiero, Kristin. “Honor, Maternity, and the Disciplining of Women: Infanticide in Late Nineteenth-Century Buenos Aires.” Hispanic American Historical Review 72.3 (1992): 353–373.
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Dealing with cases of infanticide, this article brings to light the connection between honor and maternity and the terrible dilemma faced by women who were pregnant out of wedlock.
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Seed, Patricia. To Love, Honor, and Obey in Colonial Mexico: Conflicts over Marriage Choice, 1574–1821. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988.
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Centered on love, marriage, and choice, this study uses a combination of literature such as plays about honor and the conflicts over marriage choice of young Mexicans. It charts the changes in attitudes over the course of the colonial period. Reprinted most recently in 2004.
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Sloan, Kathryn A. Runaway Daughters: Seduction, Elopement, and Honor in Nineteenth-Century Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2008.
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A study centered on voluntary abductions in 19th-century Oaxaca, through which young couples forced consent to their marriages because of the stain of the woman’s honor. Apart from judicial documents, the author examines popular culture to show changing norms.
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Twinam, Ann. Public Lives, Private Secrets: Gender, Honor, Sexuality, and Illegitimacy in Colonial Latin America. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999.
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A fundamental text that examines how people regularized illegitimate children through a process called gracias al sacar. It shows how private acts had an impact on public honor and lives, and illustrates how elite women escaped public shame.
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von Germeten, Nicole. Violent Delights, Violent Ends: Sex, Race, & Honor in Colonial Cartagena de Indias. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2013.
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An examination of the ways that sexuality could play a role in the struggles for power both of men and women in Cartagena, this study also sheds light on the greater permissiveness of sexual morals despite honor codes.
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Race and Limpieza de Sangre

Honor was tied to identity and social standing; thus, in the colonial world, rank was also tied up with racial designations. Martínez 2008 provided the first comprehensive exploration of notions of purity of blood and the use of lineage to secure rank and status. Twinam 2015 explores the other side of this question: those who aspired to higher rank through the process of whitening. These works provide complementary views of the way that race played an important role in constructing identities of honor in colonial, multiracial societies, but it was not a fixed feature. Rather, ideas about racial identity could be manipulated by social and legal practices.

Martínez, María Elena. Genealogical Fictions: Limpieza de Sangre, Religion, and Gender in Colonial Mexico. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008.
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Ideas of race and racial purity that originated in Spain had to be adapted within colonial settings to a multiracial society. Explores the origins and operationalization of such ideas in New Spain.
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Twinam, Ann. Purchasing Whiteness: Pardos, Mulattos, and the Quest for Social Mobility in the Spanish Indies. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2015.
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An exhaustive exploration of the way in which race played a role in honor and in using the gracias al sacar as an entry into the process of whitening. Demonstrates the complexity of race and the possibilities for professionalization and advancement.
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Space and Honor

Lauderdale Graham 2006, a pioneering book first published in 1988, shows that different spaces become associated with characteristics of morality and honor. The fundamental division between house and street shaped the way that residents viewed people and attributed rank and morality to them. Gayol 2000 combines the study of spatial patterns and masculinity and examines the ways in which men constructed an honorable masculine identity combining bodily attributes and behavior appropriate to the setting. Lipsett-Rivera 2012 takes this analysis further, linking spatial elements such as center and periphery as well as high and low to the ways that people constructed their honor within gendered frameworks.

Gayol, Sandra. La sociabilidad en Buenos Aires: Hombres, honor y café, 1862–1910. Collección Plural 1. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Ediciones del Signo, 2000.
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An exploration of honor in the cafés and streets of Buenos Aires—these were very male spaces where men asserted their honor and defined themselves. Honor lurks in the first section of the book, but the last chapter, on insults, addresses it directly.
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Lauderdale Graham, Sandra. House and Street: The Domestic World of Servants and Masters in Nineteenth-Century Rio de Janeiro. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006.
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Originally published in 1988 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press), the first work to describe the ways that societies conceptualized spaces as honorable; the author clarifies the division between homes and streets. It also shows how the conduct of all household members was connected to the household head’s honor.
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Lipsett-Rivera, Sonya. Gender and the Negotiation of Daily Life in Mexico, 1750–1856. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2012.
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This book explores the frameworks provided by gender to classify spaces according to status and morality. The higher status afforded to interior and upper areas affected gendered interactions and also women’s bodily comportment.