Historia de la Revolución mexicana (review)

This compact book offers an excellent reference guide for students of the Mexican Revolution, as well as a good interpretive essay that situates new scholarship within the larger body of existing work. As an historiographical piece, it introduces the debates that have influenced our understanding of the revolution and how that understanding has changed over time. Barrón shows how different contemporary conditions have affected historical interpretations about the meaning of the revolution and the post-revolutionary state.

The essay outlines general patterns in the literature from older standard interpretations that present the revolution as a mass-based uprising seeking fundamental change, to revisionist treatments that challenged that view, through the major works of the 1980s that offered a new synthesis and put the Mexican revolution in its broader international context. Despite their many differences of interpretation, one thing that these larger studies of national scope made clear was the varied experiences and local meanings of the revolution. The logical result was a renewed surge in regional studies that has produced, as Friedrich Katz notes in the Prologue, a new level of understanding of social, cultural, and economic change that accompanied the revolution, as well as ways in which popular aspirations have been frustrated. The essay concludes with reflections on the New Cultural History and the direction of current scholarship.

The bulk of this book is a large bibliography of works on the revolution that the author has divided into several sections. It begins with what are called "general histories" and includes the obvious such as political, social, economic, regional and cultural histories, as well as sections on historiographical essays, memoirs, and primary source guides. As such, the book offers an excellent reference for anyone, especially the first-time researcher, interested in almost any aspect of the revolution. The fact that the works are broken down into readily identifiable categories should prove quite useful. Authors of certain works may not agree with the category in which their work appears, bibliographies in some sections are stronger than others, and works of key significance receive a dot next to their listing designed to aid students, although more seasoned users of this guide will all have their own opinions about these rankings. Barrón has done a valuable service for those interested in studying the Mexican Revolution. This book offers an excellent resource that will benefit novices and experts alike.