Properties of Violence: Law and Land-Grant Struggle in Northern New Mexico

Acknowledgments

xi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS MOST ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, PARTICULARLY ONES written for scholarly books, start with something about how writing a book takes the support of a lot of people. It’s true, of course, and I have plenty of people to thank and debts I can’t possibly repay. But in writing this book I learned something else about this work. It can be awfully lonely. It requires months combing through archives alone; untold afternoons and evenings reading books, articles, and reports in seclusion; years drafting chapters behind a desk and a closed door; even more time revising, editing, and then revising again. And it’s all done alone. Writing is a lonely thing indeed. Thankfully, along the way, I’ve had the privilege and joy of meeting, befriending, and benefiting from the companionship and help of some amazing friends, activists, and scholars. Nik Heynen is an inspiring scholar and activist and the series editor for the Geographies of Justice and Social Transformation series, of which this book is a part, at the University of Georgia Press. This project would never have seen the light of day without Nik’s interest in my work. My colleagues in the Department of American Studies at the University of New Mexico have been nothing but supportive and inspiring. Amy Brandzel, Jennifer Denetdale, Alyosha Goldstein, Laura Gomez, Rebecca Schreiber, Michael Trujillo, Alex Lubin, Gabriel Meléndez, Vera Norwood, Irene Vasquez, Gerald Vizenor, and Peter White constitute an inspiring and wonderful faculty. In particular, I’ve had many conversations about this book with Alex. He’s a good friend and a great scholar, and I hope this work reflects the kind of rigorous , politically committed scholarship that he practices. Alyosha and Rebecca have become good friends and mentors, and this book is better because of them. Special thanks to the chair of the department, Gabriel Meléndez. I’ve also had the good fortune to work with some fantastic graduate students at unm, particularly Berenika, Miles, Sam, and Summer, whose intelligence and intellectual curiosity I greatly admire. Beyond the Department of American Studies, I’m lucky to have colleagues at unm like the folks in geography, particularly Mindy Harm Benson, Scott Freundschuh, and Maria Lane. Kate Lenzer did terrific cartographic work. The maps are her accomplishment. Bill Fleming, David Henkel, and Teresa Cordova in community and regional planning are old friends and mentors. xii • acknowledgments Thanks to Matt McCourt, Brad Dearden, and Cathleen McAnneny from the University of Maine, Farmington. Jennifer West and the Santa Fe New Mexican were generous in permitting me to use their photos in the book. This book has benefited from the support and encouragement of friends and colleagues. I owe a debt of gratitude that I’ll never be able to repay to Kay Matthews. She read and commented on every sentence that appears in this book, and it’s better because of her. Andy Doolen carefully read several chapters . He’s a great scholar and a great writer with the all-important critical eye. I always turned to him when I needed a tough appraisal. Jake Kosek’s work and support have been an inspiration. He has been a friend and a cheerleader for this project. Lorena Oropeza is an incredibly generous and brilliant scholar and great friend. At least twice along the way, she sat me down, and together we mapped out a way to complete this book. Derek Krissoff at the University of Georgia Press has been remarkable for his patience and confidence in this project. Thanks also to Tad Mutersbaugh, who has served as a mentor of incomparable generosity. I learned from watching Tad that good scholarship, like so much else in life, is about putting in the hard work, every day, all the time. You need a few good ideas too, and Tad has those in spades. I hope this book rises to the level he expects of me. Thanks to many current and former New Mexicans: David Benavides, Ike DeVargas, Em Hall, (honorary New Mexican) Eric Perramond, Richard Rosenstock, Jakob Schiller, Eric Shultz, and the late, great Mark Schiller. I’ve presented portions of this project over the years at conferences of the Association of American Geographers, the Critical Geography Conference, and the Western Social Science Association, and at invited lectures and seminars at the Office of the New Mexico State Historian, the unm history department lecture series, the unm geography department colloquium, the University of Kentucky geography colloquium and the Environments and Societies workshop at the...