Abstract
In 1946 a seminal ethnohistoric study about Afro descendants was published in Mexico and aside from few scholars, policy makers, and educators who lauded the work, the groundbreaking research was ignored. Mexico had built by then a powerful sense of being a mestizo—mixed race—nation founded on the encounter of the Spanish conquerors and the native population. For three centuries Mexicans lived under a caste system, which was abolished upon independence in 1821. The new country began to shape its ideology of nationhood based solely on the notion that those two groups conformed the roots of its existence. It completely erased the contributions of thousands of the Afromexicans. It took two hundred years after independence to formally begin to recognize that Mexico is a mestizo country based on three broad groups: Indigenous, African, and Spanish. This paper examines Afromexican historical development and the current efforts to resurrect the “third root” of the nation’s mestizaje. In doing so, the study analyzes three broad periods, colonial, post-independence, and post-revolution to contextualize the contemporary conditions of Afromexicans.
Presenters
Magdaleno ManzanárezVice President and Professor, External Affairs, Western New Mexico University, New Mexico, United States Julieta Altamirano-Crosby
Co-Founder and Executive Director, Equity, WAGRO Foundation, Washington, United States Laurence French
Affiliate Professor, College of Liberal Arts, University of New Hampshire, New Hampshire, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
Civic, Political, and Community Studies
KEYWORDS
Afromexicans, History, Politics, Racism, Slavery, Nationhood
