Paper Topics | Spring 2020 | Paper 5
Due: Saturday, February 15 at 5:00 p.m., in your conference leader’s Eliot Hall mailbox
Target length: 1,800–2,000 words
1. Over the course of the Tira de la Peregrinaćion, the Mexica are frequently dislocated from one place and move to Compare how the different stages of their journey are represented. How does the Tira use pattern, repetition, and variation to create a narrative about the foundation of the Mexica people?
2. In Stories in Red and Black: Pictorial Histories of the Aztecs and Mixtecs, Elizabeth Hill Boone claims that Aztec codices (like the Tira de la Peregrinaćion) use sign “systems that communicate information directly to the .., systems of writing that do not detour through speech to be understood. They function independently of language, although they operate on the same logical level as spoken language and can parallel it” (p.30). Focusing on a small number of folds, discuss how the meanings generated by different sign systems interact with each other (or not) in the Tira. Does your analysis support or complicate Boone’s claim? (See the course resources page for a list of sign systems incorporated into the Tira.)
3. Both the 1524 Nuremberg map that Mundy discusses in her article and the first page of the Codex Mendoza depict the physical space of the city of Tenochtitlan, and both of these sources are, in their own ways, products of sixteenth-century encounters between the Mexica and the Spanish. How do these two maps compare in terms of how they represent space and power? In explaining the similarities and differences between the maps, you might think about how each of them reflects interactions between the Mexica and the Spanish.
4. Analyze how the Codex Mendoza represents the power of the tlatoani of Tenochtitlan (i.e. the ruler of the city-state or altepetl). Be sure to consider both the visual and verbal aspects of how the codex represents power. Consider questions like these: What is the source of the tlatoani’s legitimacy? What are the trappings of his power? What qualifies him as a better or worse ruler? What are the boundaries of his power?
5. Book 12 of the Florentine Codex relates the fall of Tenochtitlan in three ways: through narratives in both Nahuatl and Spanish, and through ink-and-watercolor pictures. How do the Spanish, Nahuatl, and pictorial versions differ in how they narrate the conquest? You may wish to focus your analysis on two or three distinct episodes (chapters) of Book 12.
6. Do a close reading of the song “Another to the same tone, a plain one” (Bierhorst, 139), paying particular attention to how performance and the idea of a “flower and song” genre are crucial for understanding the text.
7. The Lienzo de Tlaxcala represents the woman known as Malinche, Malintzin, or Doña Marina in multiple settings or situations (see the Gallery for the major examples). What argument is the Lienzo making about Malinche's power? What role does it suggest she played in the conquest of Tenochtitlan? What is the significance of her being represented this way in a text produced by Tlaxcalans? Support your argument with specific visual evidence from multiple "cells" of the Lienzo de Tlaxcala.