Glottopolitik und Translationspolitik in Neu-Spanien. Der Einfluss des ‚miserables-Diskurses‘ auf koloniale Translationspraktiken

This article revolves around translation politics as a consequence of colonial politics in New Spain. The colonizers categorized the indigenous population as personas miserables, a juridical term which had emerged in Europe. We examine the influence of this label on translation practices taking place in the context of the Catholic mission as well as in the juridical and notarial sphere. To this end, we analyze Spanish-Zapotec documents dating from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries from Oaxaca, Mexico. The hypothesis is that this ambiguous status, which characterizes the population as immature and in need of protection, shaped translation procedures in translations into Zapotec, but also created scope for the indigenous population to participate in political decision-making processes, as can be demonstrated on the basis of translations from Zapotec into Spanish.