Autoethnography
In "Arts of the Contact Zone," Mary Louise Pratt introduces a term very unfamiliar to many people. This term, autoethnography, means the way in which subordinate peoples present themselves in ways that their dominants have represented them. Therefore, autoethnography is not self-representation, but a collaboration of mixed ideas and values form both the dominant and subordinate cultures. They are meant to address the speaker's own community as well as the conqueror's. Pratt provides many examples of autoethnography throughout her piece, including two texts by Guaman Poma and her son, Manuel. Although very different in setting, ideas, and time periods, they accomplish the difficult goal of cross-cultural communication. Guaman Poma, an Andean who claimed noble Inca descent, wrote a twelve hundred page long letter in 1613 to King Philip III of Spain. This manuscript was particularly unique because it was written in two languages, Spanish and Quechua, the native language of the Andeans. "Quechua was not thought of as a written language . . . ., nor Andean culture as a literate culture" (584). This letter proved the theory wrong. Somehow, Poma interacted with the Spanish in a "contact zone", which is
Poma combines his Andean knowledge with his Spanish knowledge. He "constructs his text by appropriating and adapting pieces of the representational repertoire of the invaders" (589). At one point, he makes the Spaniards seem foolish and greedy. "The Spanish, . . . ., brought nothing of value to share with the Andeans, nothing 'but armor and guns with the lust for gold, silver, gold and silver'. . . ." (587). It is obvious from this quote that Poma intentionally exaggerates the Spaniards to be an avaricious people. He believes that they have brought nothing useful to the Andeans but ways of greed and a hunger for power. By writing in their own language, Poma shows his oppositional representation of the Spaniards. Although Manuel's paragraph was a mass of misspellings, his teacher still rewarded him with the usual star for completion of the task assigned or for just obeying orders. The humor of it was not recognized. It could have been that his teacher did not truly see Manuel's point or that his teacher could have totally disregarded his humor altogether. "No recognition was available, however, of the humor, the attempt to be critical or contestatory, to parody the structures of authority" (593). Manuel's goal was not accomplished, although he did do better than Guaman Poma. His piece reached the intended recipient, but with no prevail. Both outcomes were, in essence, the same. His transcultural character is not only seen in the written text, but also in the visual content of some four hundred pages. The drawings show the subordinate-dominant plane of the Spanish conquest. They depict the Inca way of life, as well as the greedy nature of the Spanish. The drawings themselves are European in s
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1161
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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