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  • Building Nineteenth-Century Latin America: Re-Rooted Cultures, Identities, and Nations
  • Shannon Baker
Building Nineteenth-Century Latin America: Re-Rooted Cultures, Identities, and Nations. Edited by William G. Acree Jr. and Juan Carlos González Espitia. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2009. Pp. viii, 285. Contributors. Index. $79.95 cloth; $34.95 paper.

William G. Acree Jr. and Juan Carlos González Espitia have edited an important anthology examining "the process of and meanings that resulted from nation building throughout the nineteenth century" (p. 1). The editors and contributors did not shy away from the complexity of their stated objective; instead they explored how multiple actors attempted to define 'nation' in countries characterized by ethnic, political, and social diversity. They argued successfully that nation-building thus became a process of continuous negotiation that was never truly complete.

The anthology includes chapters by both literature and history professors whose areas of specialization span the nineteenth century as well as the region of study. The selected authors have analyzed a wide array of sources such as newspapers, pamphlets, coins, works of art, and published works, featuring studies of Argentina, Cuba, Mexico, Paraguay, and Venezuela, at various time periods throughout this critical century. Chapters that focus on the independence era itself emphasize how new citizens struggled to accomplish a sense of nation, while contributions regarding the late-nineteenth century often offer insights into how people worked to strengthen national identities. In addition, although all of the scholars utilized historical sources, their modes of analysis differ to include the methods of both historians and literary critics. Indeed, the editors themselves claim that "the contributors highlight the lack of scholarly consensus regarding some of the subjects and concepts that are being studied" (p. 5). Rather [End Page 282] than coming across as a weakness, this approach emerges as a strength in the book, illustrating the very real complexity of nineteenth-century Latin America.

Given the broad scope of this work, as well as the divergent views of the contributors, strong organization proves critical to the book's success. Acree and González Espitia accomplish this by highlighting themes that appear throughout the work in their introduction and by structuring it into three sections. The first section, entitled "Lasting Impressions," focus on the process by which citizens and the government alike utilized printed words and images to build legitimacy in new nations. Authors Hugo Achugar and Amy Wright deftly illustrate that printed materials did not influence only the literate. Achugar, for example, asserts that "state art," such as coins, communicated messages to people of all social classes, because almost all citizens participated in the cash economy. Wright has studied the influence of serial novels in Mexico, emphasizing that by delivering the material in a newspaper, the authors communicated to an audience beyond the elite. For example, she asserts that people frequently read newspapers out loud to illiterate citizens. In the second section, "Cultures on Display," the authors have focused on how cultural productions such as carnival celebrations influenced the construction of social identities in Latin America. Beatriz González-Stephan studied Venezuela's first national fair in 1883 to argue skillfully that visual culture, such as the displays at the fair, helped create a national identity by establishing a common narrative among the literate and illiterate. The third section, "Ideologies, Revelations, and Hidden Nations," is not as cohesive as the first two; instead of sharing a strong thematic connection, these contributions all focus on a single era—the late nineteenth century. Still, the authors have made valuable contributions. Terry Rugeley, for example, demonstrates how the violence of the Caste Wars paved the way for the acceptance of Porfirianism in the Yucatan.

Taken as a whole, this anthology presents a nuanced examination of the complex process of nation-building. The authors adeptly present dialogues of nation-building that break through the conventional constraints of political speeches and editorials to include visual displays, literature, coinage, and carnival. They demonstrate that regardless of the nation or the decade, Latin Americans—literate and illiterate, rich and poor—participated in an often-contested and always exciting conversation about national identity.

Shannon Baker
Texas A&M University-Kingsville
Kingsville, Texas

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