The indigenous Bribri in anthropological vision of naturalistic scientists: Costa Rica in the late nineteenth century

Abstract

This article explores the anthropological understanding of the Bribris, an indigenous group of Costa Rica, developed toward the end of the nineteenth century by three founders of Costa Rican anthropology: the naturalist scientists William Gabb, Henry Pittier and Carl Bovallius. The paper addresses these authors’ contact with the Bribris, analyzing how they formed “anthropological questions” about otherness. It suggests that the national and international 19th century scientific context endowed these naturalists with authority. With this authorization, albeit the existence of nuanced perspectives regarding the Bribris among them, they shaped the Bribris as exotic and inferior, as if they were a declining uncivilized people whose territory should be opened up to non-indigenous waves of colonization.