Author ORCID Identifier:

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5798-0474

Date of Graduation

12-2025

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies (PhD)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies

Advisor/Mentor

Restrepo, Luis Fernando

Committee Member

Almenara, Erika

Second Committee Member

Austin, Shawn

Keywords

Colonial Studies; Joseph Gumilla; Orinoco

Abstract

This dissertation examines El Orinoco Ilustrado (EOI) by Joseph Gumilla as a layered textual and cartographic artifact central to the production of colonial knowledge in the Orinoco River basin. Moving beyond surface narratives of evangelization and exploration, it interrogates the sombras and silencios implanted in the Jesuit chronicle. Through an intradisciplinary approach combining literary analysis, archival research, and visual studies, the study reveals how EOI helped construct imperial visions of space, race, and resource extraction in eighteenth-century Spanish America. The dissertation is structured around six chapters. Chapter One outlines a theoretical framework. Chapter Two provides a longue durée historical context, analyzing early modern reading practices, critical historiography, and Indigenous exchange networks in the Orinoco region. Chapter Three investigates EOI as a Jesuit response to accusations of smuggling and labor abuses, highlighting the strategic use of narrative to defend missionary legitimacy. Chapter Four turns to the book’s printing licenses, analyzing how they framed the Orinoco as a space of imperial promise and spiritual relevance. Chapter Five explores cartographic strategies and the ideological function of omission, particularly through the absence of self-governed Black settlements like Nirva and Indigenous cultural objects such as Bastón de Mando. Chapter Six reads EOI’s indexes as archival devices and follows the cultural trajectories of annatto and cacao, concluding in the story of Juan de León, an enslaved man who sought to purchase his freedom with cacao.

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