Overview
Chicana/o history has reached an intriguing juncture. While academic and intellectual studies are embracing new, highly nuanced perspectives on race, class, gender, education, identity, and community, the field itself continues to be viewed as a battleground, subject to attacks from outside academia by those who claim that the discipline promotes racial hatred and anti-Americanism. Against a backdrop of deportations and voter suppression targeting Latinos, A Promising Problem presents the optimistic voices of scholars who call for sophisticated solutions while embracing transnationalism and the reality of multiple, overlapping identities. Showcasing a variety of new directions, this anthology spans topics such as growth and reassessment in Chicana/o history manifested in a disruption of nationalism and geographic essentialism, the impact of legal history, interracial relations and the experiences of Latino subpopulations in the US South, race and the politics of religious history, transborder feminism in the early twentieth century, and aspirations for a field that increasingly demonstrates the relational dynamics of cultural production. As they reflect on the state of their field, the contributors offer significant insights into sociology, psychology, anthropology, political science, education, and literature, while tracing the history of activism throughout the last century and debating the very concepts of ""Chicano"" and ""Chicano history."" Although the political landscape is fraught with closed-off rhetoric, A Promising Problem encourages diversity of thought and opens the possibilities of historical imagination.
Full Product Details
Author: Carlos Kevin Blanton
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Imprint: University of Texas Press
Dimensions:
Width: 15.20cm
, Height: 1.80cm
, Length: 22.90cm
Weight: 0.340kg
ISBN: 9781477309032
ISBN 10: 1477309039
Pages: 224
Publication Date: 08 March 2016
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Professional & Vocational
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: In Print
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Reviews
[A Promising Problem's] essays offer fresh insights that make this edited collection a worthwhile read. * Pacific Historical Review * What is fresh about these essays is their insistence that a multitude of actors, both within and outside of Latina/o communities, has shaped Chicana/o history and identity...A Promising Problem both highlights new work and raises...important questions for continued debate. * Western Historical Quarterly * The essays assembled [in A Promising Problem] represent a variety of topics and subfields, though Blanton is careful to note that the volume is far from exhaustive or representative of all Chicana/o history. Nonetheless, the collection captures well the field's 'promising problem.' * Journal of Southern History * While the essays [in A Promising Problem] represent the broad spectrum of Mexican American history, all authors speak to each other by referencing each other's work and pointing out common findings across chapters. This technique makes for a much more integrated and tightly-woven anthology than is common among such books, indicating that much thought went into crafting the study. * Bulletin of Spanish Studies *
""[A Promising Problem's] essays offer fresh insights that make this edited collection a worthwhile read."" * Pacific Historical Review * ""What is fresh about these essays is their insistence that a multitude of actors, both within and outside of Latina/o communities, has shaped Chicana/o history and identity...A Promising Problem both highlights new work and raises...important questions for continued debate."" * Western Historical Quarterly * ""The essays assembled [in A Promising Problem] represent a variety of topics and subfields, though Blanton is careful to note that the volume is far from exhaustive or representative of all Chicana/o history. Nonetheless, the collection captures well the field's 'promising problem.'"" * Journal of Southern History * ""While the essays [in A Promising Problem] represent the broad spectrum of Mexican American history, all authors speak to each other by referencing each other's work and pointing out common findings across chapters. This technique makes for a much more integrated and tightly-woven anthology than is common among such books, indicating that much thought went into crafting the study."" * Bulletin of Spanish Studies *
The essays assembled [in A Promising Problem] represent a variety of topics and subfields, though Blanton is careful to note that the volume is far from exhaustive or representative of all Chicana/o history. Nonetheless, the collection captures well the field's 'promising problem.' -- (05/01/2017) What is fresh about these essays is their insistence that a multitude of actors, both within and outside of Latina/o communities, has shaped Chicana/o history and identity...A Promising Problem both highlights new work and raises...important questions for continued debate. -- (05/01/2017) While the essays [in A Promising Problem] represent the broad spectrum of Mexican American history, all authors speak to each other by referencing each other's work and pointing out common findings across chapters. This technique makes for a much more integrated and tightly-woven anthology than is common among such books, indicating that much thought went into crafting the study. -- (07/06/2017) [A Promising Problem's] essays offer fresh insights that make this edited collection a worthwhile read. --Pacific Historical Review (08/01/2018)
While the essays [in A Promising Problem] represent the broad spectrum of Mexican American history, all authors speak to each other by referencing each other's work and pointing out common findings across chapters. This technique makes for a much more integrated and tightly-woven anthology than is common among such books, indicating that much thought went into crafting the study. * Bulletin of Spanish Studies * The essays assembled [in A Promising Problem] represent a variety of topics and subfields, though Blanton is careful to note that the volume is far from exhaustive or representative of all Chicana/o history. Nonetheless, the collection captures well the field's 'promising problem.' * Journal of Southern History * What is fresh about these essays is their insistence that a multitude of actors, both within and outside of Latina/o communities, has shaped Chicana/o history and identity...A Promising Problem both highlights new work and raises...important questions for continued debate. * Western Historical Quarterly * [A Promising Problem's] essays offer fresh insights that make this edited collection a worthwhile read. * Pacific Historical Review *
Author Information
CARLOS KEVIN BLANTON is an associate professor of history at Texas A&M University.
