Description
Book SynopsisExamines the cultural, political, and legal representations of Mexican Americans and the development of US capitalism and nationhood. From the Mexican-American War of 1846-1848 through the period of mass repatriation of US Mexican laborers in 1939, this book explores both Mexican-American and Anglo-American cultural production.
Trade ReviewDiscussions of Latino cultural citizenship and public culture have a distinguished and stimulating lineage in the work of major figures such as Renato Rosaldo, Rina Benmayour, and William Flores. With his new book that introduces literary history into the discussion, we must now add the name of John-Michael Rivera. -- José E. Limón,author of American Encounters: Greater Mexico, the United States, and the Erotics of Culture
Offers an eloquent and compelling account of nineteenth and twentieth century cultural productionone that resituates Mexicanos at the center of thinking about U.S. nation-making during the nineteenth century and beyond. . . . This stunning new text promises to reshape literary and theoretical work in American Studies. -- Mary Pat Brady,author of Extinct Lands, Temporal Geographics: Chicana Literature and the Urgency of Space
The books research base is impressive, and Riveras reading of his sources is sophisticated, nuanced, and informed by the latest scholarship in ethnic, literary, sociological, and historical studies. -- Ernesto Chavez,University of Texas at El Paso
In elegant (and enviable) prose, Riveras work calls for continued inquest into the role of stories, land, and memory in the formation of current Mexican political collectivities. * Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction "How Do You Make the Invisible, Visible?": Locating Stories of Mexican Peoplehood 1 Don Zavala Goes to Washington: Translating U.S. Democracy 2 Constituting Terra Incognita: The "Mexican Question" in U.S. Print Culture 3 Embodying Manifest Destiny: Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton and the Color of Mexican Womanhood 4 Claiming Los Bilitos: Miguel Antonio Otero and the Fight for New Mexican Manhood 5 "Con su pluma en su mano": Americo Paredes and the Poetics of "Mexican American" Peoplehood Conclusion: Recovering La memoria: Locating the Recent Past Notes Bibliography Index About the Author
