Footprints of evolutionism in Uruguay’s proto-anthropological literature about Charruas in the turn of the century (1890-1911)

Abstract

Toward the end of the 19th century, evolutionist currents in anthropology were discussing the distance between “primitive” people from Western civilization. Unilineal evolutionism attributed to authors such as Edward Burnett Tylor or Lewis Henry Morgan asserted the controversial observation that “primitive” peoples possessed culture, disputing the separation between “savage” and “civilized” categories upon which Herbert Spencer’s influential ideas were built. These discussions permeated the world’s anthropologies and proto-anthropologies, including those in La Plata region. This article examines the influence of these debates in Uruguay by analyzing three influential texts about the Charrúa people during the transition from the 19th to the 20th century: José Henriques Figueira’s Los primitivos habitantes del Uruguay (1892), Francisco Bauzá’s Historia de la dominación española en el Uruguay, (1895) and Orestes Araújo’s Historia de los charrúas y demás tribus indígenas del Uruguay (1911).