Black Mexico: Race and Society from Colonial to Modern Times » (New Edition)

The essays in this Collection Build Upon a Series of Conversations and papers that resulted from "New Directions in North American Scholarship on Afro-Mexico," a symposium conducted at Pennsylvania State University in 2004. The issues addressed include contested historiography, social and economic contributions of Afro-Mexicans, social construction of race and ethnic identity, forms of agency and resistance, and contemporary inquiry into ethnographic work on Afro-Mexican communities. Comprised of a core set of chapters that examine the colonial period and a shorter epilogue addressing the modern era, this volume allows the reader to explore ideas of racial representation from the sixteenth century into the twenty-first.

Illustrations xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction: Black Mexico and the Historical Discipline Ben Vinson III 1

Section 1 Entering the Colonial World

Slave Rebellion and Liberty in Colonial Mexico Frank "Trey" Proctor III 21

Negotiating Two Worlds: The Free-Black Experience in Guerrero's Tierra Caliente Andrew B. Fisher 51

Black Aliens and Black Natives in New Spain's Indigenous Communities Pat Carroll 72

From Dawn 'til Dusk: Black Labor in Late Colonial Mexico Ben Vinson III 96

Colonial Middle Men? Mulatto identity in New Spain's Confraternities Nicole von Germeten 136

Potions and Perils: Love-Magic in Seventeenth-Century Afro-Mexico and Afro-Yucatan Joan Bristol Matthew Restall 155

Section 2 Engaging Modernity

"Afro" Mexico in Black, White, and Indian: An Anthropologist Reflects on Fieldwork Laura A. Lewis 183

My Blackness and Theirs: Viewing Mexican Blackness Up Close Bobby Vaughn 209

The Thorntons: Saga of an Afro-Mexican Family Alva Moore Stevenson 220

The Need to Recognize Afro-Mexicans as an Ethnic Group Jean-Philibert Mobwa Mobwa N'djoli 224

Glossary 233

Bibliography 241

Contributors 266

Index 269