A sophisticated, state-of-the-art study of the remaking of Christianity by indigenous societies, Words and Worlds Turned Around reveals the manifold transformations of Christian discourses in the colonial Americas. The book surveys how Christian messages were rendered in indigenous languages; explores what was added, transformed, or glossed over; and ends with an epilogue about contemporary Nahuatl Christianities. In eleven case studies drawn from eight Amerindian languages—Nahuatl, Northern and Valley Zapotec, Quechua, Yucatec Maya, K'iche' Maya, Q'eqchi' Maya, and Tupi—the authors address Christian texts and traditions that were repeatedly changed through translation—a process of “turning around” as conveyed in Classical Nahuatl. Through an examination of how Christian terms and practices were made, remade, and negotiated by both missionaries and native authors and audiences, the volume shows the conversion of indigenous peoples as an ongoing process influenced by what native societies sought, understood, or accepted. The volume features a rapprochement of methodologies and assumptions employed in history, anthropology, and religion and combines the acuity of of methodologies drawn from philology and historical linguistics with the contextualizing force of the ethnohistory and social history of Spanish and Portuguese America. Contributors : Claudia Brosseder, Louise M. Burkhart, Mark Christensen, John F. Chuchiak IV, Abelardo de la Cruz, Gregory Haimovich, Kittiya Lee, Ben Leeming, Julia Madajczak, Justyna Olko, Frauke Sachse, Garry Sparks "As pathbreaking and revisionist as what Robert Ricard advocated some eighty years ago... A most welcome addition to the ethnohistory of colonial Latin America. Most valuable is its originality and the exacting level of scholarship necessary to generate such important studies." Susan Schroeder, Tulane University "These [essays] help show what happened on some of the most daunting frontiers of cultural exchange, where distinctive forms of Catholicism emerged. Creative misunderstandings, tense collaborations, fruitful contention: every type of encounter is represented here, with vivid evocations." Felipe Fernández-Armesto, University of Notre Dame "A significant contribution to colonial scholarship... a carefully edited collection of colonial linguistic and native evangelization studies by leading scholars [examining] the role of native and alphabetical languages in generating indigenous Christianities." Néstor Quiroa , Latin American Antiquity "An intriguing assembly of cross-disciplinary investigations, exploring from different angles the ways in which indigenous Christianities emerged and proliferated in Spanish America. This volume raises big questions for the study of some purportedly old processes and breathes new life into the art of historical interpretation." Kenneth Mills, University of Michigan "This volume articulates and develops the concept of indigenous Christianities, from New Spain to the Brazilian Amazon, in new and valuable ways... The work's geographic breadth, the rich array of sources introduced by contributors, and several strong and novel analyses make this an important contribution." Erika R. Hosselkus , Ethnohistory "This collective volume is, without any doubt, a significant contribution to the research about the Amerindian worlds in Latin America in the colonial period ... Highly recommended." -- Guillaume Candela, Cahiers des Amériques latines "Recommended for all scholars and students of religion and indigenous peoples of the Americas." Owen Jones , International Journal of Latin American Religion "This book is part of an important moment in the historiography of colonial Latin America... [and represents] the cutting-edge research that is redefining the study of indigenous religions of the Americas and their relationship to Christianity." Josefrayn Sánchez-Perry, Reading Religion "This volume's chapters highlight the variety of Catholicisms presented to the Indigenous populations of Latin America and how Native peoples localized Christianity and remade it according to their own cultural logic... Recommended" Choice David Tavárez, a professor of anthropology at Vassar College, is the author of Rethinking Zapotec Time Cosmology, Ritual, and Resistance in Colonial Mexico  and  The Invisible War: Indigenous Devotions, Discipline, and Dissent in Colonial Mexico , and a coauthor of two volumes,  Painted Words , and   Chimalpahin’s Conquest . He has also published more than sixty peer-reviewed articles and chapters on Latin American history, linguistic anthropology, and Mesoamerican studies. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, his research has also been supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, and the John Carter Brown Library. Words & Worlds Turned Around Indigenous Christianities in Colonial Latin America By David Tavárez University Press of C