Readers in their context. The defense of José Fernández Madrid in the face of the testimonies and the writing of Colombian history, 1821-1830

Abstract

This paper examines the electoral participation in In our local historiography, the problem of reading and the confrontation of the meaning of the past in the history of the revolution, during the third decade of the nineteenth century, has been understudied. This paper aims to reconstruct the reading practices from which a critical view was taken and a certain public opinion was developed regarding the narration of events from the republican past, linked to the independence processes in New Granada. To this end, the defense of José Fernández Madrid is examined in the face of testimonies, narratives and what he referred to as the “denaturalization of facts” in the nascent Colombian history, which began to be invented after the events of Boyacá in 1819 and following the enactment of the Political Constitution of 1821. The paper aims to draw attention, on the one hand, to the truthfulness criteria that were applied to the testimonies of the protagonists of Independence when confronted with the reader’s interpretation, documents and proofs. On the other hand, it aims to point out the uses made by the enlightened republicans in order to justify their “political behavior” and preserve the “reputation”, at a moment when the political foundations of the new Republic were being invented and legitimized. In this context, the paper attempts, from a methodological point of view, to advance in the field of the history of reading by analyzing the discussions, defenses, comments and responses from the reading public, to legitimize their critical attitude towards the forms of ignorance fostered by the writing of history.