"We Distrust the Whole Universe": Long-Distance Communications, Emotions, and the Transformation of the Public Sphere in Chile, 1790–1812.

This essay examines the emergence of transparency as a communication ideal among elites in Chile during the crisis of the Spanish Empire. While traditional interpretations highlight newspapers and salons as harbingers of modern communication principles, this article foregrounds the role played by lo...

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Publicado en:Hispanic American Historical Review Vol. 105; no. 3; pp. 499 - 533
Autor principal: Bowen, Martín
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Duke University Press Aug2025
Materias:
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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        Communication
        Emotions
        Manuscripts
        Misinformation
        Censorship
        Political communication
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          Communication
          Emotions
          Manuscripts
          Misinformation
          Censorship
          Political communication
      ab: This essay examines the emergence of transparency as a communication ideal among elites in Chile during the crisis of the Spanish Empire. While traditional interpretations highlight newspapers and salons as harbingers of modern communication principles, this article foregrounds the role played by long-distance networks and manuscript correspondence in this process. The royal mail was the first institution in the colony to be subjected to demands for total transparency. This, I argue, was tied to how network participants interacted with the specific emotional, political, and social protocols governing the mail. Beginning in the 1790s, anxiety over misinformation and external threats drove colonists to scrutinize and question imperial control over the mail. As the monarchy collapsed in the early nineteenth century, information manipulation and conflicting communication norms caused mounting emotional distress, eventually leading elites to contest censorship and embrace transparency as a radical norm of political communication.
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