Making Malambo: Black Collective Action in Early Spanish America

Making Malambo is a unique study of a free Afro-Panamanian community that challenged their monarch’s recent tax imposition in the sixteenth century and won. They did so by constructing a collective narrative of their political and military accomplishments, which was attested by a group of Spanish sworn witnesses. The project examines their narratives, which also implicate the female majority of their community in those military actions, as a kind of community autobiography of civic participation. Their narratives are also put into conversation with those of their Spanish supporting witnesses, which share their interest in ending the tax, but for distinct reasons: they fear that angering the community would leave the fragilely-held region unprotected from cimarrones, French and English corsairs, and other dangerous rebels. The resultant book will offer a new perspective on free Black populations in the Spanish empire, on gender, and on methods for reading difficult historical sources.