Robins readign

I found the Robins reading on “Atrocity as Metaphor: The Symbolic Language pf Rebellion” especially interesting this week. In discussions, we have discussed the fact that Spaniards and Natives could not verbally communicate. Robins sheds some interesting light on ways in which they were able to communicate with each other. He notes that “Many were anything but inarticulate and expressed themselves clearly through the symbolic nature of their actions” (142). The rebels used symbols to make peace with the Spaniards. By wearing Spanish style clothing and caring an image of Christ, Tupatu was able to show the Spaniards that he came peacefully (146). Robins has numerous examples of symbolic hatred and abuse by the rebels. A noteworthy story was when the rebels attacked Pocoata and the escort of Corregidor Alós. In this encounter, they chopped of the hand of the scribe and cut out the tongue of the advisor, before finally killing these two men. Robins highlights that these men were first “striped of their ability to perform their roles in society, to write and speak” (147), and then finally killed. On the surface it is obvious that the Spaniards and native people could not communicate verbally but we can see that there were other ways to communicate successfully and in many ways far more dramatically. This article by Robins demonstrates that taking an alternative approach to understanding actions of the rebel leaders can give us some answers and prove to be very interesting .

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