Time Schedule:
Adam W Warren
HSTAA 282
Seattle Campus
Overview of Mexican history from late Aztec times until the twenty-first century. Emphasizes how women, campesinos, indigenous populations, free and enslaved Afro-Mexicans, and the urban poor experienced the past, challenged colonial and post-colonial rule, and shaped modern Mexican society and culture.
Class description
This course provides a broad overview of the history of Mexico from the late Aztec period until modern times by examining how groups traditionally seen as powerless or marginalized within Mexican society—women, campesinos (peasants), indigenous populations, free and enslaved Afro-Mexicans, and the urban poor—experienced, understood, and shaped the world in which they lived. By looking at social history “from below” rather than elite political history “from above,” readings and lectures in this course will demonstrate how popular groups negotiated colonial power relations, challenged, and at times subverted Spanish rule. The course will also examine how such populations defended their interests and fought for a political voice in the newly emerging nation-state after Independence and during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The course will conclude with an extended analysis of the Chiapas uprising and the contemporary popular politics of Mexico under NAFTA.
Student learning goals
General method of instruction
Lecture and discussion.
Recommended preparation
No prerequisites.
Class assignments and grading
Papers, midterm, and final.
