In the course of five hundred years, the region now referred to as Latin America went from being the target of one of the most comprehensive evangelizing projects ever attempted, to becoming the Catholic Church’s strongest bastion. Far from static or monolithic, the richness, variety, and controversial character of such a long-lasting presence is reflected in the history of Latin American thought: among the many intellectuals influenced by Catholicism, one finds prophetic crusaders, poetic nuns, pious indigenists, radical liberals, reactionary antimoderns, authoritarian politicians, conservative feminists, ecclesiastical fascists, left-wing revolutionaries, and even a Pope. Catholicism has been, throughout the centuries, a never-ending source of inspiration for all sorts of intellectual traditions in the region.
The objective of this course is to introduce students to Catholicism’s deep and lingering imprint in Latin America by means of a close-reading approach to some of its main intellectual figures, from the 15th century to the 21st. More than an institutional history of the Church, the course offers a survey of Latin American Catholic thought across the ages, focusing on its unceasing dynamism and intellectual heterogeneity. In terms of assigned readings, in-depth analysis of primary sources will be accompanied by contextualizing secondary literature.
