Latin America Since Independence: A History with Primary Sources - Paperback

by Alexander Dawson (Author)

Now in its third edition, Latin America since Independence explores the region's rich and diverse history through carefully selected stories, primary source documents, maps, and tables that offer a diverse approach to dominant historical narratives.

While histories of the "other" Americas often link disparate histories through revolutionary or tragic narratives, this text begins with the assumption that our efforts to imagine a common past for nearly thirty countries are deeply problematic. Without losing sight of chronology or regional trends, the book offers a distinctive conceptualization of the region as a diverse social landscape with a multiplicity of peoples and voices. Each chapter introduces students to a specific historical issue, which in turn raises questions about the history of the Americas as a whole. Key themes include:

• Race and Citizenship
• Inequality and Economic Development
• Politics and Rights
• Foreign Interventions
• Social and Cultural Movements
• Globalization
• Violence and Civil Society
• The Environment

Chapters also include timelines highlighting important dates and suggestions for further reading. This third edition has been updated throughout and includes a new Chapter 9 that discusses foreign intervention in Central America, and new text on the drug wars, resource extraction, and indigenous self-determination.

Richly informative and highly readable, Latin America since Independence provides compelling accounts of this region's past and present that will be of interest to students of Latin American history and society.

Author Biography

Alexander Dawson is a Professor of History at the University at Albany (SUNY), USA. He is the author of Indian and Nation in Revolutionary Mexico (2004), First World Dreams: Mexico Since 1989 (2006), and The Peyote Effect: From the Inquisition to the War on Drugs (2018).