Spanish explorers and colonists visited, settled, and claimed territory in 42 of the United States’ 50 states. So what does the history of Early America look like from a Spanish point of view? Brandon Bayne, an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and author of the book Missions Begin with Blood: Suffering and Salvation in the Borderlands of New Spain, joins us to investigate some of the religious aspects of Spanish colonization. Specifically, the work of Spanish missionaries.
This episode is supported by an American Rescue Plan grant to the Omohundro Institute from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
About the Show
Ben Franklin’s World is a podcast about early American history.
It is a show for people who love history and for those who want to know more about the historical people and events that have impacted and shaped our present-day world.Ben Franklin’s World is a production of the Omohundro Institute.
Episode Summary
Brandon Bayne, an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and author of the book Missions Begin with Blood: Suffering and Salvation in the Borderlands of New Spain, joins us to investigate the work of Spanish missionaries and why this missionary work was carried out by just a few religious orders, namely the Franciscans and Jesuits.
During our conversation, Brandon reveals information about New Spain, its borderlands. and the ways in which Spanish and Indigenous peoples interacted within those borderlands; The work of Catholic missionaries and Spain’s use of missionaries as instruments of colonization; And, details about the Jesuits, their work in New Spain, and why the Spanish Crown ultimately expelled the Jesuits from New Spain in 1767.
What You’ll Discover
- Contact zones of encounters
- Comparing cultures
- New Spain and its borderlands
- Indigenous peoples of New Spain’s northern borderlands
- The process of Spanish colonization in New Spain
- Royal patronage and Catholic conversion
- Catholic missionaries as instruments of colonization
- Details about the religious orders hired to colonize the Americas
- Poverty vows and American colonization
- Jesuit missionaries and their work in New Spain
- Jesuit education in Indigenous languages
- Work and life of a Jesuit missionary
- North American missions
- Jesuit expulsion from North America & New Spain
- What we gain when we think about Spain’s role in early America
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Time Warp Question
In your opinion, what might have happened if the Spanish crown had not expelled the Jesuits from New Spain in 1767? How might the history of the Americas have been different if the Jesuits had continued to be involved in Spain’s colonization project?
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