The Making of Eighteenth-Century Eurocentrism and the Inception of the Colombian Nation

In my paper I will discuss how the inception of the Colombian nation was inextricably linked to the worldwide racialisation of difference, underpinning the making of eighteenth century Eurocentrism. I aim at pursuing this objective, by showing how, on the one hand, an intertwined set of discourses on climate, beauty, taste, sexual behavior, manners, commerce and luxury were at the core of the making of eighteenth century Eurocentrism; and on the other, how they provided a transnational interface of meanings underpinning the inception of the Colombian nation and the forging of a Creole identity. I will argue that the imagining of Colombia was deeply bound to the ways in which Creoles approached the eighteenth century thesis of American inferiority, a global-scale representation integral to the making of Eurocentrism. I will discuss how such response entailed an active construction of New Granada’s human diversity; it entailed circumscribing the generalised European dismissive interpretation of the New World into specific bodies, practices, times and spaces. I will highlight how in the making of such response, Creoles’ appropriation of the set of discourses underpinning the making of eighteenth century Eurocentrism played a paramount importance. I will illustrate this by exploring the Semanario del Nuevo Reyno de Granada, a newspaper published in Bogotá between 1808 and 1811, which constituted an important platform of expression of New Granadan Creole’ elite.