Between defecto and estropeo: physical impairment and (dis)ability in the early-modern Spanish Atlantic

• Published in: Colonial Latin American review Vol. 33; no. 3; pp. 277 - 298
• Main Author: Eissa-Barroso, Francisco A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 02-07-2024; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Alberto Bertodano; Antonio Benavides; critical disability studies; Disability; Disability history; disabled veterans; Discomfort; Fernando de Rojas y Mendoza; Hispanic people; Humiliation; limb difference; People with disabilities; Physical disabilities; royal officials; Spain
• ISSN: 1060-9164; 1466-1802
• DOI: 10.1080/10609164.2024.2403832

This article explores the experiences of disabled, white, Spanish men who served, or sought to serve, the Spanish Crown in the Americas. It seeks to understand how early-modern Spanish attitudes towards specific physical and sensorial impairments disabled individuals who, otherwise, enjoyed significant privilege and power in a highly racialized and gendered society. It argues that early-modern Spanish society distinguished between defecto-'natural' physical or sensorial impairment present from birth or developed gradually over time-and estropeo-impairment acquired at a specific point in time. Although the distinction was not always clear-cut, and the blurred boundaries between both categories could be manipulated, impairments construed as the result of estropeo posed less of an obstacle to professional aspirations, while still often forcing individuals to negotiate their disability in public, facing significant encumbrance, discomfort and humiliation. The article furthers our understanding of disability and impairment as historically and culturally determined categories. It invites further study of (dis)ability in building a broader and more inclusive understanding of the societies of the early-modern Hispanic world.