Catholicism, Gentilism and Mestizaje in West Africa and West Center in the eighteenth century

Abstract

This work deals with cultural mixing processes that occurred in the Iberian enclave of West Africa and Central West, especially in the forms of mixed Catholicism that arose in these regions; It provides a discussion about the relations built between the Lusitanian and indigenous, as well as the ways they found to live religions; It also shows the role of illustrated governor D. Francisco Inocêncio Sousa Coutinho and his actions to inhibit the gentilism. Therefore, the primary sources deposited were used in the AHU, chroniclers and historiography on the subject. The entire debate gives birth to the concept of mestizaje developed by Serge Gruzinski observing the phenomenon as a factor that hit the modern civilization as integrated to the people and the New World areas to the Iberian expansion project. The varieties that have arisen to Catholicism practices were multiple, differing in both regions analyzed, but seeking to involve indigenous and Lusitanian completely, thus becoming vectors for the spread of crossbred practices in other parts of the globe.