Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791
This article examines the applicability of Habermas’ concept of the public sphere to the periodical paper the Mercurio Peruano in 1791. It compares the conditions of production of Habermas’ ‘model’ eighteenth-century European bourgeois public sphere to those of a colonial, ancien régime Lima complet...
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| Format: | Article |
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Taylor & Francis
2017
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/38856/ |
| _version_ | 1848795706753548288 |
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| author | Sharman, Adam |
| author_facet | Sharman, Adam |
| author_sort | Sharman, Adam |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | This article examines the applicability of Habermas’ concept of the public sphere to the periodical paper the Mercurio Peruano in 1791. It compares the conditions of production of Habermas’ ‘model’ eighteenth-century European bourgeois public sphere to those of a colonial, ancien régime Lima complete with Inquisition censorship. It suggests that Habermas’ literary—rather than political—public sphere, training ground for a critical civic public reflection, is the more fruitful concept. Moving beyond contextualist explanations, it argues that the Mercurio’s Enlightenment meditations on the capital’s ‘civil system’—on its commerce and its cafés—construct the public sphere through and in the productive force of critical reason itself. In its patriotic pages we glimpse both the signs of a ‘modern’ public sphere of civil society in the interstices of formal politics before independence and a reminder that the public sphere, based on a reason that exceeds any determinate historical structure, is never exclusively modern. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:36:21Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-38856 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:36:21Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | Taylor & Francis |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-388562020-05-04T19:59:30Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/38856/ Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 Sharman, Adam This article examines the applicability of Habermas’ concept of the public sphere to the periodical paper the Mercurio Peruano in 1791. It compares the conditions of production of Habermas’ ‘model’ eighteenth-century European bourgeois public sphere to those of a colonial, ancien régime Lima complete with Inquisition censorship. It suggests that Habermas’ literary—rather than political—public sphere, training ground for a critical civic public reflection, is the more fruitful concept. Moving beyond contextualist explanations, it argues that the Mercurio’s Enlightenment meditations on the capital’s ‘civil system’—on its commerce and its cafés—construct the public sphere through and in the productive force of critical reason itself. In its patriotic pages we glimpse both the signs of a ‘modern’ public sphere of civil society in the interstices of formal politics before independence and a reminder that the public sphere, based on a reason that exceeds any determinate historical structure, is never exclusively modern. Taylor & Francis 2017 Article PeerReviewed Sharman, Adam (2017) Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791. Hispanic Research Journal . ISSN 1745-820X (In Press) public sphere; Mercurio Peruano; Enlightenment |
| spellingShingle | public sphere; Mercurio Peruano; Enlightenment Sharman, Adam Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title | Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title_full | Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title_fullStr | Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title_full_unstemmed | Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title_short | Towards a literary public sphere: the Mercurio Peruano, Lima, 1791 |
| title_sort | towards a literary public sphere: the mercurio peruano, lima, 1791 |
| topic | public sphere; Mercurio Peruano; Enlightenment |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/38856/ |