Chapter One. Otherness And Identity: Judeoconversos, Judaism, Afroiberians And Christianity

Abstract

This chapter provides some discussion of the kinds of identity, the variety of subject positions that might have been held by Afroiberians and Judeoconversos, to provide some contours to the interactions between members of these groups. As a good deal of our knowledge regarding these personal and collective identities derives from sources from the Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions, it then offers some meditations on these institutions and the hermeneutical challenges of relying on their documentation. Afroiberian religiosity provides an opportunity for further contemplation of identity. Other than Ethiopian Christianity, all African religions were viewed as false or heretical, if they were even taken seriously as ?religion.' Sephardim played an important role in various aspects of Atlantic and general international commerce. In family-based networks that spanned European motherlands and their colonies, Crypto-Jews and Sephardim at various times were active in trading pepper and spices, sugar, indigo, chocolate, slaves, coral and diamonds.Keywords: Afroiberians; Atlantic; Crypto-Jews; Ethiopian Christianity; identity; Judeoconversos; Portuguese Inquisitions; Sephardim; Spanish Inquisitions