Abstract

GARCIA-FERNANDEZ, Máximo. Ancient Regime Civilization: Castilian Appearances and Portuguese Material Culture Looking towards Latin America. Historelo.rev.hist.reg.local [online]. 2022, vol.14, n.30, pp.15-45.  Epub May 03, 2022. ISSN 2145-132X.  https://doi.org/10.15446/historelo.v14n30.93291.

This article adopts an analytical-comparative, as well as argumentative, methodological approach. The arguments are grounded on the historiographical treatment of notarial and epistolary sources for popular material culture in Spain and Latin America, and draw from the evidence collected by several consolidated research projects. In essence, the article examines and compares Spanish and Brazilian dress during the 18th century, with special emphasis on public appearance as a civilizational link in operation in both sides of the Atlantic during the final phase of the Ancient Régime. By that time, domestic material culture was changing, family and individual appearance being a central part of social organization. Western civilization advanced vigorously, and the dependences-impositions and contrasts of these intertwined perspectives, still within a highly sacralized context, must not be understood as an arrest of progress and cultural advancement. The article examines various instances of these differences and commonalities, showing the different paces of the collective advance towards contemporaneity, in which tradition and modernizing trends combined.

Keywords : civilization; appearances; symbolism; material culture; dress; everyday life.

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