Mexico on the Historical Couch

February 2010

Headlines and sound bites remind us every day of the violence that has plagued Mexico since President Felipe Calderón declared war on the drug cartels in late 2006.  Bloody turf wars and bureaucratic corruption compete with the global economic downturn for the attention of the mainstream media, while some politicians and pundits on both sides of the ideological spectrum look to score political points by keeping any discussion of immigration reform a wedge issue with voters.  As political temperatures rise and social commentary turns into ideological shouting matches, there is no better way to temper polemics than to seek out the sobering analysis of historical perspective. 

ASM associate curator of ethnohistory Michael Brescia has co-authored, with Dirk Raat, a new book that examines the history of Mexico through its relationship with the United States.  Published by the University of Georgia Press, Mexico and the United States: Ambivalent Vistas takes the long view of the Mexican past and filters it through a lens conditioned by the growth and expansion of the United States, not to mention the complexities of the global economy. 

Ranging from Mexican antiquity and the arrival of the Spanish and British to the present-day administrations of Felipe Calderón and Barack Obama, Brescia and Raat evaluate the political, economic, and cultural trends and events that have shaped the ways Mexicans and Americans have viewed each other over time.  They pay particular attention to the cultural dynamics and political economy of the Gran Chichimeca or Mexamerica, the borderlands region where the two countries share a common history. 

The book is available for purchase at Native Goods, the Arizona State Museum store, via the Internet at any of the major online shopping enterprises, or directly from the University of Georgia Press.

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