Somebody's Children: The Politics of Transracial and Transnational Adoption. By Laura Briggs. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2012. Pp. xi, 360. Notes. Bibliography. Index $25.95 paper; $94.95 cloth.
My only qualms are what seems to be an intermittent confusion on the difference between the concepts of jurisdiction—authority over people who might reside in a number of different areas (tributaries, as exemplified by Dona Catalina Tuza who passed her chiefly authority over 44 tributaries to Don Pedro Cellin; p. 136)—and territoriality (a reference to "regional caciques . . . who ruled over vast territories"; p. 135). For the latter, see also pp. 121, 142, and 231. Such discrepancies might be related to the reduction policy, which over time transformed the notion that authority was population-based (before the reordering and resettlement of the 1560s and 1570s) into the notion tJiat it is more place-bound (for example, by town) afterwards. The absence of precise dating makes a determination by the reader impossible. A second factor might be the translation and comprehension of die term "pueblo," which was generally understood as "people" or "population" before the Spanish reducciones, but came to denote "town," (a fixed location), after the reducciones (p. 164). Admittedly outside the scope of the study but of tantalizing interest are a few recurring indigenous names, which may be evidence of "positional inheritance" (pp. 163-164, p. 246).