Spanish Conquest and Colonization in the Americas, 1492-1700

Catalog description

This course is intended to introduce students to several topics relating to the conquest and colonization of the region now known as Latin America. These topics and the historical literature surrounding them are essential in understanding the development of both colonial Latin America and the history of the colonial United States. The topics will include examinations of the conquest and colonization of each region of Latin America (from the U.S. Southwest, Mexico, the Andean Region, and lesser known frontiers). Within each topic or section of the course, we will begin with a selection of some of the modern secondary historical literature on the subject, and then we will consider the actual primary documents and sources upon which these histories were written.