Overview

"According to census projections, by 2050 nearly one in three U.S. residents will be Latino, and the overwhelming majority of these will be of Mexican descent. This dramatic demographic shift is reshaping politics, culture, and fundamental ideas about American identity. Neil Foley, a leading Mexican American historian, offers a sweeping view of the evolution of Mexican America, from a colonial outpost on Mexico's northern frontier to a twenty-first-century people integral to the nation they have helped build. Mexicans have lived in and migrated to the American West and Southwest for centuries. When the United States annexed those territories following the Mexican-American War in 1848, the unequal destinies of the two nations were sealed. Despite their well-established presence in farm fields, workshops, and military service, Mexicans in America have long been regarded as aliens and outsiders. Xenophobic fantasies of a tidal wave of Mexicans overrunning the borders and transforming ""real America"" beyond recognition have inspired measures ranging from Operation Wetback in the 1950s to Arizona's draconian SB 1070 anti-immigration law and the 700-mile security fence under construction along the U.S.-Mexican border today. Yet the cultural, linguistic, and economic ties that bind Mexico to the United States continue to grow. Mexicans in the Making of America demonstrates that America has always been a composite of racially blended peoples, never a purely white Anglo-Protestant nation. The struggle of Latinos to gain full citizenship bears witness to the continual remaking of American culture into something more democratic, egalitarian, and truer to its multiracial and multiethnic origins."

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9780674048485

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Reviews

Mexicans in the Making of America offers a rich narrative history rooted in politics and international relations that brings a sweeping historical dimension to contemporary immigration debates. Foley demonstrates the ways in which U.S. Mexican relations reverberate across the border, often with unanticipated outcomes.--Vicki L. Ruiz, University of California, Irvine, and president-elect, American Historical Association

With Mexicans in the Making of America, Foley offers a sweeping and deeply insightful interpretation of the historical evolution of Mexican America from a small and scattered constellation of far-flung colonial frontier outposts to the current situation in which more than one of every ten Americans now claims Mexican descent or heritage.--David G. Gutierrez, University of California, San Diego

With Mexicans in the Making of America , Foley offers a sweeping and deeply insightful interpretation of the historical evolution of Mexican America from a small and scattered constellation of far-flung colonial frontier outposts to the current situation in which more than one of every ten Americans now claims Mexican descent or heritage.--David G. Gutierrez, University of California, San Diego

Foley provides a panoramic lesson about Mexican America that begins with the Spaniards, mestizos, and Indians of the 16th-century colonial province of Nuevo Mexico. He carries the timeline through its five-century stretch to a future in which one in three U.S. residents will be Latino.--Casey Sanchez Pasatiempo (04/17/2015)

Author Information

Neil Foley holds the Robert H. and Nancy Dedman Chair in History at Southern Methodist University.

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