History of Mexico (367-0-20)

Instructors

Paul Gillingham
847/467-4829
Harris Hall - Room 323
Paul Gillingham (DPhil, Oxon, 2006) specializes in politics, culture and violence in modern Mexico, and has published numerous articles and book chapters on these subjects. His most recent book is Unrevolutionary Mexico: The Birth of a Strange Dictatorship (2021). His first book, Cuauhtémoc’s Bones: Forging National Identity in Modern Mexico (2011), was awarded the Conference on Latin American History’s Mexican history prize. Gillingham is the co-editor of Dictablanda: Politics, Work, and Culture in Mexico, 1938-1968 (2014), Journalism, Satire, and Censorship in Mexico (2018), and the Violence in Latin American History series at the University of California Press. He has translated Oscar Altamirano’s monograph on Edgar Allen Poe, Poe: The Trauma of an Era (2017) and is currently writing a history of Mexico since 1511. He directs the Mexican Intelligence Digital Archives project (MIDAS), an open access collection of documents from Mexico’s security agencies at https://www.crl.edu/midas.

Meeting Info

Harris Hall L06: Tues, Thurs 9:30AM - 10:50AM

Overview of class

It was 1534, or maybe 1535, when the Spaniards found him among the dead, far to the south in Honduras. He was dark-skinned, pierced and tattooed, and he had led the Maya people of Chetumal to war for two decades. But he was also in his own way white, a fellow Spaniard called Gonzalo Guerrero, and his three children, born of marriage with a Maya woman, might be seen as the first Mexicans. The history of Mexico, understood as the country and people that grew from those first contacts, began with that Spaniard in 1511 when his caravel foundered on Scorpion Reef over sixty miles north of the Yucatán peninsula. This course traces that history from the beginning until the present, when Mexico faces a War on Drugs like no other.

Learning Objectives

To obtain an empirically-rich overview of five centuries of Mexican history. To hone reading, analytical and writing skills.

Evaluation Method

participation, 10%; research paper, 35%; mid-term and final examinations, 55%

Class Notes

History Major Concentration(s): Americas
History Minor Concentration(s): Latin America

Class Attributes

Advanced Expression
Historical Studies Foundational Discipline
Social and Behavioral Science Foundational Discipl
Historical Studies Distro Area
Global Perspectives on Power, Justice, and Equity
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area

Enrollment Requirements

Enrollment Requirements: Registration is restricted to History Majors and Minors only until the end of pre-registration, after which time enrollment will be open to everyone who has taken the prerequisites (if any)