Familia, infancia y sociedad en la colonia neogranadina. Estudio sociológico e histórico.

Abstract

The author approaches the subject as a broad approach in the context of Hispanic America, and with greater dedication and depth in relation to the issue of children in our Colombian reality. In these pages, the author transcends the merely historical sense and, based on the most meticulous and serious investigation of documents, he emphasizes the phenomenological characteristics of those human groups, our children of the XVII and XVIII centuries, passive subjects of a society nourished by religious fanaticism and racial complexes. To the author's open and vigilant eye, none of the factors that intervene in the formation of the social group as such, in its structure, in its composition, in its formation and in its development, escape. We have before us an exhaustive sociological vision of the social stratum that we call childhood, which has rarely been studied as an element of significance; Paez Morales makes us think about it and leaves us thinking. He begins the study by presenting the social context in which we must place ourselves. It is a universe that begins its historical presence after an action of conquest and colony. The "New World' is born, and that moment of its birth is a time with remarkable characteristics. The author's vision throughout the four chapters is complete. By this we mean that he sets his descriptive and explanatory analysis within the conditions and mechanisms of the social order, but, at the same time, he has permanently present the perception of the historical moment of change and transformation characteristic of that period of American history. Social composition, legislation, ideological formation, economic management, health, protection, art and elements of social order are present in these pages, treated with objectivity, acuity and deep knowledge of the method of comprehensive analysis on the broad topic of the family in its most interesting representation: childhood. The result is an excellent material that should be present as a basis for any scientific concern that wants to go into the study and analysis of our current social and family reality. "A society is defined not only by its attitude towards the future, but also towards the past ... Its memories are no less revealing than its projects". the words of the Mexican Octavio Paz, brought to mind by the author of this book, are a clear indication of the essential objective of his work as a noble and valuable contribution towards future historical-sociological work on our reality as a mestizo, acculturated indigenous westernist people, which is the great contradiction of our current reality.