Glimpses of Mexico and California

Glimpses of Mexico and California
Author: Mrs. S. M. Lee
Publisher:
Total Pages: 134
Release: 1887
Genre: California
ISBN:

"These letters, written in the haste of travel, and with no thought of publication, are printed in the hope that an account of what I saw in old Mexico and new California in 1886 may prove interesting to the next generation as the incidents of a journey I took to the Mississippi River in 1838 have always been to my own children."--Author's preface

The Borders Within

The Borders Within
Author: Douglas Monroy
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
Total Pages: 268
Release: 2022-07-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 0816549338

Throughout its history, the nation that is now called the United States has been inextricably entwined with the nation now called Mexico. Indeed, their indigenous peoples interacted long before borders of any kind were established. Today, though, the border between the two nations is so prominent that it is front-page news in both countries. Douglas Monroy, a noted Mexican American historian, has for many years pondered the historical and cultural intertwinings of the two nations. Here, in beautifully crafted essays, he reflects on some of the many ways in which the citizens of the two countries have misunderstood each other. Putting himself— and his own quest for understanding—directly into his work, he contemplates the missions of California; the differences between “liberal” and “traditional” societies; the meanings of words like Mexican, Chicano, and Latino; and even the significance of avocados and bathing suits. In thought-provoking chapters, he considers why Native Americans didn’t embrace Catholicism, why NAFTA isn’t working the way it was supposed to, and why Mexicans and their neighbors to the north tell themselves different versions of the same historical events. In his own thoughtful way, Monroy is an explorer. Rather than trying to conquer new lands, however, his goal is to gain new insights. He wants to comprehend two cultures that are bound to each other without fully recognizing their bonds. Along with Monroy, readers will discover that borders, when we stop and really think about it, are drawn more deeply in our minds than on any maps.

Catalogue

Catalogue
Author: C.F. Libbie & Co
Publisher:
Total Pages: 264
Release: 1925
Genre: Booksellers' catalogs
ISBN:

The Illusion of Ignorance

The Illusion of Ignorance
Author: Janice Lee Jayes
Publisher: University Press of America
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2011-02-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 0761853553

The Illusion of Ignorance examines the cultural politics of the American encounter with Porfirian Mexico as a precursor and model for the twentieth-century American encounter with the world. Detailed discussions of the logistics of conducting diplomacy, doing business, or traveling abroad in the era give readers a vivid picture of how Americans experienced this age of international expansion, while contrasting Mexican and American visions of the changing relationship. In the end, Mexico's efforts to promote Mexico as a partner in progress with the U.S. was lost to an American illusion schizophrenically divided between fantasies of American leadership toward, and refuge from, modernity. The Illusion of Ignorance argues that American ignorance of the experience of other nations is not so much a barrier to better understanding of the world, but a strategy Americans have chosen to maintain their vision of the U.S. relationship with the world.

Manifest Destinations

Manifest Destinations
Author: J. Philip Gruen
Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
Total Pages: 373
Release: 2014-09-02
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0806147318

Tourists started visiting the American West in sizable numbers after the Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroads were completed in 1869. Contemporary travel brochures and guidebooks of the 1870s sold tourists on the spectacular scenery of the West, and depicted its cities as extensions of the natural landscape—as well as places where efficient business operations and architectural grandeur prevailed—all now easily accessible thanks to the relative comfort of transcontinental rail travel. Yet as people flocked to western cities, it was the everyday life that captured their interest—the new technologies, incessant clatter, and all the upheaval of modern metropolises. In Manifest Destinations, J. Philip Gruen examines the ways in which tourists experienced Chicago, Denver, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco between 1869 and 1893, a period of rapid urbanization and accelerated modernity. Gruen pays particular attention to the contrast between the way these cities were promoted and the way visitors actually experienced them. Guidebooks made Chicago, Denver, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco seem like picturesque environments sprinkled with civilized buildings and refined people. But Gruen’s research in diaries, letters, and traveler narratives shows that tourists were interested—as tourists usually are—in the unexpected encounters that characterize city life. Visitors relished the cities’ unfamiliar storefronts and advertising, public transit systems, ethnic diversity, and multiple dwellings in all their urban messiness. They thrust themselves into the noise, danger, and cacophony. Western cities did not always live up to the marketing strategies of guidebooks, but the western cities’ fast pace and many novelties held extraordinary appeal to visitors from the East Coast and abroad. In recounting lively anecdotes, and by focusing on tourist perceptions of everyday life in western cities, Gruen shows how these cities developed the economy of tourism to eventually encompass both the urban and the natural West.

Thrown Among Strangers

Thrown Among Strangers
Author: Douglas Monroy
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 356
Release: 1990
Genre: History
ISBN: 0520082753

Every California schoolchild's first interaction with history begins with the missions and Indians. It is the pastoralist image, of course, and it is a lasting one. Children in elementary school hear how Father Serra and the priests brought civilization to the groveling, lizard- and acorn-eating Indians of such communities as Yang-na, now Los Angeles. So edified by history, many of those children drag their parents to as many missions as they can. Then there is the other side of the missions, one that a mural decorating a savings and loan office in the San Fernando Valley first showed to me as a child. On it a kindly priest holds a large cross over a kneeling Indian. For some reason, though, the padre apparently aims not to bless the Indian but rather to bludgeon him with the emblem of Christianity. This portrait, too, clings to the memory, capturing the critical view of the missionization of California's indigenous inhabitants. I carried the two childhood images with me both when I went to libraries as I researched the missions and when I revisited several missions thirty years after those family trips. In this work I proceed neither to dubunk nor to reconcile these contrary notions of the missions and Indians but to present a new and, I hope, deeper understanding of the complex interaction of the two antithetical cultures.

On the Edge of America

On the Edge of America
Author: Paul J. Karlstrom
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 344
Release: 1996-01-01
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780520088504

"The past quarter century has witnessed the emergence of a scholarly appreciation of American art in California. Yet assessments of the early modern (pre-1950) have been haphazard. Now in one bold volume, these scholars have remedied that deficiency. Thanks to the rich essays of this wonderful book, the art history of California--and the nation!--is graced with further light."--Dr. Kevin Starr, State Librarian of California "The authors of these essays illuminate a diverse and compelling history, one in which what happened at the geographic edges sheds new light on the European points of original. A lively and valuable contribution, not just to regional history, but to the making and transmission of modernism."--Whitney Chadwick, Professor of Art History, San Francisco State University "A welcome and overdue evaluation of the distinctive history of modernism in California, these essays sensitively explore a cultural terrain at once familiar and strange, surveying memorable achievements from painting to photography to architecture and film. The authors provocatively suggest the centrality of 'edges'--wherever they are found--to the national tale, and demonstrate it through significant developments on our western margin. A must for any serious student of American art and culture."--Charles C. Eldredge, The University of Kansas "An engrossing examination of modernist practices in California before the Abstract Expressionists and beatniks came to town. It includes art scenes peopled by Mexican muralists, European artists in exile, third-generation Californians, idealist photographers, and immigrant artisans."--Wanda Corn, Professor of Art History, Stanford University "These fascinating essays do much more than fill a major gap in our understanding of American regionalism. Their scope is superb because of the inclusive range of their definition of 'art, ' the varied ethnicities of the artists discussed, and the distinctive impact of environment, light, and culture on California art. A dazzling treasure, as pleasing to the eye as it is to the mind."--Michael Kammen, Professor of History, Cornell University