by Rhea Wood

Created on: November 28, 2009

A major way Spanish conquistadors changed Central America, was in the way Spanish culture altered Andean culture. Andean culture struggled for a time to continue unchanged, but as time went on and Spaniards and Andean peoples mixed more and more, the culture became harder and harder to preserve unaltered. Dualities began to emerge in those areas where Spanish and Andean cultures were irreconcilable.

One of the saddest dualities that arose from the Spanish conquest could be found within every Andean person who had to act as a liaison between their people and the conquerors. The conquerors, after all, could only rule if they could communicate effectively and have enough support to ensure basic operations ran smoothly. The people they chose to act as their liaisons were often the traditional Andean elite, the "Kurakas," who already had the trust of their people and could convince them to act for the benefit of the Spaniards. Kurakas were "essential" to the Spaniards, at least in the early stages of the conquest.

The Kurakas, however, were only useful as long as they still commanded some kind of authority and influence over the Andean people. They had authority and influence as result of traditional relationships within the society, yet in their service of the conquerors, they aided in destroying many of the values and customs holding their society together. Not only that, they risked destroying what made them Kurakas in the first place.

The Spaniards, in their enlistment of the Kurakas' help, "strove to transform them into imitation Spaniards," perhaps to serve as an example of how to happily make the move from Andean values to European ones. If the Kurakas became too "Spanish," however, they could lose their people's trust. Their only value to the Spaniards was their position of power within Andean society; if that power was lost because they were no longer believed to hold their people's best interests at heart, they became essentially worthless. They lost their place in society; no longer one of the Andeans, but useless to Spanish society as well, they found themselves in an empty void between two opposing cultures.

Kurakas were not the only Andeans who found themselves in this void; any enterprising native who wanted to improve their lot in life by becoming friendly with the Spaniards risked the same expulsion from Andean society. As time passed, the 'safe space' between Andean and Spanish cultures continued to shrink. A rare few managed to find this space

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