The Casta System

In Colonial Latin American the notion of one’s race combined both a person’s physical traits and their socio-economic standing. In this way, their racial identity was subject to both their phenotype and economic status. To provide order to the class structure and provide a clear racial hierarchy Latin American colonies set up the Casta system which was immediately complicated by the intense racial mixing which occurred between the Spanish settlers, Natives and African slaves. Since early in the colonization process mostly male Conquistadores came to the New World, they often took native women resulting in racial mixing. At the top of the racial hierarchy of the Casta system were the peninsulares who were born in in Spain itself and were residing in the New World, these Spaniards held the highest government offices and were the only ones who were

Outwardly people would make judgements based on who white one’s skin was. This unhealthy practice would later lead to Latin American nations implementing policies of Blanqueamiento, or whitening, which marginalized non-Europeans from the media and prominent positions of power. For centuries colonists lived under the lived under conditions where in order to hold public office or those being questioned by the Inquisition had to prove that they were of European descent and did not have “impure” blood. In Spanish colonies race and class were deeply intertwined, in many ways they informed each other, each playing off the other. Therefore, it was possibly by accruing enough wealth and conforming to European society that one could raise their social standing. Jane Mangan portrays these racial roles in her book, Trading Roles, where she examines how Spanish and Natives interacted in the city of Potosi. She details how race determined what businesses someone could own and where they could operate that business within the city