II International Conference on Bartolomé de Las Casas

July 15-16, 2019
Providence College
Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A.

---

Conference Overview

The Second International Conference on Bartolomé de Las Casas brought together scholars from North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia to examine the life, thought, legacy, and continuing significance of Bartolomé de Las Casas. The conference explored themes including Indigenous peoples, slavery, evangelization, moral theology, political thought, scholasticism, and the reception of Las Casas across the Atlantic world.

Conference Organizers

• David Thomas Orique, O.P., Providence College
• Rady Roldán-Figueroa, Boston University

Conference Program

Monday, July 15, 2019

Opening Session

8:25 a.m.
Ruane Center, Rooms 205/206

• Opening Remarks: David Orique, O.P. and Rady Roldán-Figueroa
• Greetings from Providence College Administration

Panel 1: Las Casas and the Polemics of Slavery and the Black Legend

9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.

Chair: Paul S. Vickery (Oral Roberts University)

• Rady Roldán-Figueroa and David Orique – Bartolomé de las Casas and the 19th Century Transatlantic Debate over Slavery
• Jonathan Baier – A Hero of the People? Bartolomé de Las Casas, the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the Development of Spanish America
• Jorge Abril Sánchez – Black Legend: 17th Century Readings of Las Casas
• Nathaniel Adam Tobias Coleman – Anglo-Spanish Anti-Slavery: An Edwardian Entanglement

Panel 2: The Historical Reception of Las Casas

11:15 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

Chair: Pedro Quijada (University of Minnesota)

• Andrew L. Wilson – Las Casas from Bolívar to Pancho Villa
• Dwight E. R. TenHuisen – Antonio de la Calancha and His Translators as Readers of Las Casas
• Paul S. Vickery – Belief and Practice: Ethical Consistency in the Life and Message of Bartolomé de Las Casas

Panel 3: Las Casas and Amerindian Cultures I

2:15 p.m. – 4:15 p.m.

Chair: Vanina M. Teglia (Universidad de Buenos Aires)

• Rubén Sánchez-Godoy – Translation and Representation in Don Francisco Tenamaztle
• Garry Sparks – Idoling Around with God(s) in Guatemala
• Frauke Sachse – Las Casas and the Divine Social Orders of the Indigenous Americans
• Guillaume Candela – Evangelization of Indigenous Peoples of Paraguay

Panel 4: Las Casas and Moral Theology

4:30 p.m. – 5:50 p.m.

Chair: Justin Brophy, O.P. (University of Notre Dame)

• Victor Zorrilla – Dubious Conscience and Erroneous Conscience in Las Casas and Medina
• Natsuko Matsumori – Hospitality or Property? The Natural Right of Communication and the New World
• Thomas Varacalli – Las Casas’s Thomistic Philosophical Anthropology

Conference Plenary Address

6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.

Jonathan F. Schwaller
Department of History, University at Albany (SUNY)

The Conflicted Humanitarianism of the Spanish Colonial Government:
Late Sixteenth-Century New Spain and the Impact of Las Casas

---

Tuesday, July 16, 2019

Panel 5: Las Casas and the Scholastic Tradition I

8:15 a.m. – 9:45 a.m.

• Javier Aldana Rojas and Juan Alexis Parada Silva – Defense of Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda at Valladolid
• Mario Ruiz Sotelo – Bartolomé de Las Casas and the Foundation of American Philosophy

Panel 6: Las Casas and Amerindian Cultures II

10:00 a.m. – Noon

• Paola Uparella Reyes – Gender, Production and Reproduction in Las Casas
• Stephanie Rohner – Las Casas in Enlightenment Debates
• Laura Ammon – Pagans and Apocalypse

Panel 7: Las Casas and Political Theology

1:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.

• María Cristina Ríos Espinosa – Las Casas’s Memorial de Remedios and Thomas More’s Utopia
• Ramón Valdivia – Theocratic Ideology in Bartolomé de Las Casas
• Vanina M. Teglia – Making the Indian a Peasant: Lascasian Colonization
• Francisco Javier Yate Rodríguez, Isabel Rincón Díaz, Sigifredo Romero Tovar – Right of Rebellion in Dialogue with Thomas Aquinas

Panel 8: Las Casas’s Legacy, Theory of Law, and Moral Cosmology

3:45 p.m. – 4:45 p.m.

• Anne-Marie Kirmse, O.P., and Alice Byrnes, O.P. – Bartolomé de Las Casas: Preaching from the Pulpit of Our Lives
• Dominic Mejia – The Moral Cosmology of Las Casas

Panel 9: Las Casas and the Scholastic Tradition II

5:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m.

• David Thomas Orique, O.P. – Las Casas’s Epistemology: Theology and Philosophy
• Elisabeth Rain Kincaid – Peace and the Common Good among the Spanish Scholastics
• Thomas Eggensperger, O.P. – Prudence and the Interpretation of Las Casas Following Thomas Aquinas

---

Conference Fellows

• Shannon Moore, Providence College
• Mary Erameh
• Emily Ascherl, Providence College
• Jesus Maldonado, Providence College
• Carly Martino, Providence College

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Providence College administrators, faculty, staff, conference fellows, and participating scholars for their support and contribution to the success of the Second International Conference on Bartolomé de Las Casas.