ABSTRACT
The Pima, Eudeve and Opata-speaking peoples of Sonora (sonoras) in the western foothills of the Sierra Madre Occidental were drawn into the Jesuit mission system during the early decades of the seventeenth century. These highland peasants, whose livelihood depended on the combined resources derived from horticulture, hunting and foraging, sustained their villages by adapting to both the missions and the incipient market for goods and labour which developed around the mining camps of Sonora and Chihuahua. Behind these outward forms of accommodation, the sonoras maintained significant levels of resistance to colonialism which reveal opposing sets of cultural values. 1 This article examines serrano attitudes towards work, time and wealth which clashed with the Spanish colonial project. It explores the theme of 'social ecology' by showing that the highlanders' means of reconstituting their households and communities under colonial rule comprised both a defence of their autonomy and a claim to vital resources.
