The Spanish AmericasIntroduction

The introduction to this special issue argues that the hemispheric turn that began more than two decades ago has not significantly altered an epistemology of scholarship that separates Anglo from Latin America. An early Americas scholarship that is truly attentive to languages, cultures, and geographies outside of nation-based disciplinary and institutional formations is therefore an ongoing necessity. Reviewing how this Anglo/Latin divide was formulated in twentieth-century historiography, we propose alternate concepts of cultural and linguistic crossings that would not lead to predetermined, teleological notions about early America. Beyond the general need to collaborate across disciplinary and institutional divisions to foster such scholarship, we suggest special attention to Spanish, a de facto second language of the United States, and to the recovery of Latino/a/x literary histories.