La Ilustración, la infancia y el juego en la Nueva España

Abstract

This article is based on three manuals written by religious dedicated in the Metropolis to the education of children and young people, who were descendants of the nobility and urban elites. In those manuals the three authors consider the game as an important part in the education of the individual; however, they differ in what the game is for. In the oldest manual, published in the first decades of the 17th century, the education was conceived as an arduous religious preparation aimed at maintaining the health of the soul so that the believer could fight against sin and temptation and this way to emerge triumphant from the fight. The role of the game in this combat was to open a parenthesis for the soul’s rest. In the two remaining manuals that date from the 18th century, the authors mention that in order to cover the requirements that the secular State demanded, the education was aimed at the formation of good citizens, loyal to the King, the Homeland and society and also, with the help of the game, healthy in body and mind and in this way, combat ignorance and idleness.