Looking for Respect in the Borderlands

River of Hope and Cultural Construction of Empire are interesting studies that analyze empire-building projects, nascent state-formation, and constructions of regional identities in the lower Rio Grande borderlands of Texas and the American frontiers of New Mexico and Arizona. Both studies stress the limits of bureaucratic authority due to the distance of borderland communities and army villages from imperial and national centers, resulting in policies of neglect and increasing discontent among inhabitants. Both authors reveal the fluid nature of identity-formation among village residents experiencing colonization and regime change, emphasizing demarcations of class and culture, and to a lesser extent, delineations of race and gender. Another feature shared by these studies is their analysis of resistance and survival strategies by conquered communities, taking care not to romanticize the agency of newly subjugated peoples while avoiding narratives of monolithic bureaucratic control.

Valerio-Jiménez’s wonderfully written and nuanced study evaluates the lower Rio Grande region of Texas from early Spanish colonization (1749–1821), to Mexican control (1821–48), and U.S. rule (1848–1900). “Everyday experiences—along with transnational political events, migration, and trade,” he argues, led generations of Mexican Americans, “to construct strategic identities that countered each nation-state’s disciplining efforts” (p. 12). Organizing his study topically with some chronological overlap, the book consists of two main sections, with the U.S.–Mexican War serving as a dividing line. In chapter one, he discusses the Spanish founding of villas del norte (northern villages) by colonists of racially mixed and humble backgrounds. He examines colonial interactions between vecinos (community members) and “Indian workers, slaves, consorts, enemies, and allies” (p. 15). Vecinos forged an ethnic and regional identity based on their presumed cultural superiority to Indians and years of military and economic self-reliance due to bureaucratic disregard by colonial officials. Vecinos distanced themselves culturally and psychologically from “indios bárbaros” like the Comanche, and “generally sought to exclude enemy Indians from their society” (p. 50). However, they sought alliances with indigenous groups like the Carrizos for mutual goals of self-defense “with neither party exercising control over the other” (p. 50). Nevertheless, in daily encounters with Indian consorts, godchildren, and laborers, vecinos remained socially dominant but eventually incorporated some indigenous peoples into their society. As Valerio-Jiménez argues, this array of responses by vecinos towards indigenous peoples reveals a colonial dynamic “more complicated than a simple ethnic binary” (p. 50).

Chapters two and three address struggles with Spanish and Mexican bureaucracies and the fracturing of river communities along class and gendered lines. By 1821, “the Mexican government eliminated racial categories from official documents,” introducing new civic categories: ciudadano (citizen), reserved for elites, and paisano (countryman), for the poorer classes (p. 107). Unfortunately for river inhabitants, Mexican independence did not alter longstanding policies of neglect and trade restrictions. Meanwhile, new economic opportunities, such as the 1823 founding of a port in Refugio, accelerated class and gender divisions in vecino society and rates of intermarriage with foreigners. By the mid-1840s, “the villas had become dependent on American supplies and trade” (p. 114).

Following independence, tejanas did not enjoy the full benefits of citizenship because of their gender and remained subjected to patriarchal authority. Continued scrutiny and legal restrictions were placed upon women’s sexual behavior by local secular officials and the Catholic Church. The ability of tejanas to seek relief from domestic violence, to access ecclesiastical divorce, and to compel suitors to uphold marriage promises was subject to male oversight and was especially challenging for lower-classed women. Lower-classed laborers, male and female, who previously experienced exploitation and rigid patriarchal control under a colonial credit-debt system, enjoyed greater autonomy in the Mexican era due to...