J. Michelle Molina, Northwestern University

Description

This paper explores the particularities of religious power, political contestation, and emergent secularism in New Spain (Mexico) through the study of silver altarware. “Altar Scenes” places the Catholic altar, with its decorative silver (or platería), at the center of a story that foregrounds the “sacramentality” of silver objects as “touch relics” that became power objects when they touched the body of Christ in its Eucharistic form. I argue that tracing sacred silver and its afterlives offers a new vantage point to observe the complex workings of church-state collaboration and contestation in the colonial era and beyond. Specifically, this research offers a novel approach to understanding how religious power has changed over the centuries by accounting for how people approached, adorned, and wielded the body of Christ.

About the Presenter

J. Michelle Molina (PhD, University of Chicago, 2004) is Associate Professor in the department of Religious Studies at Northwestern University. Molina’s research focuses on the unique place of New Spain within the history of global Catholicism. As a historian of religion, her research explores human experiences of transformation in the context of Jesuit missionary evangelization. She has recently been thinking about the materiality of sovereignty in Catholic Spanish imperial contexts.

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This event is free to all faculty, grad students, and interested members of the public, but all participants must register in advance. Space is limited, so please do not request a paper unless you plan to attend.

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About the Eighteenth-Century Studies Seminar Series

Presented by the Center for Renaissance Studies at the Newberry Library, the Eighteenth-Century Studies Seminar is designed to foster research and inquiry across the scholarly disciplines in eighteenth-century studies. It aims to provide a methodologically diverse forum for work that engages ongoing discussions and debates along this historical and critical terrain.

The seminar is organized by Timothy Campbell (University of Chicago), Jason Farr (Marquette University), Lisa A. Freeman (University of Illinois at Chicago), and Alicia Caticha (Northwestern University).