Latin America: "Born in Blood and Fire"

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to create and teach a one semester course called Latin American Studies. The last word gave me freer rein to take a broader, more flexible cultural approach than straight-out history (which is my nature). If in the beginning I knew little in depth about the subject, the first round of students in the class knew next to nothing. On the first day, I had them do a free association exercise about their understanding of anything south of the United States, and they came up with things like the drug trade, smuggling, dictators, illegal immigrants, jungles, poverty, tacos, music and dancing. I kid you not. Clearly, there's always the need for more education! Luckily, by the end of the first semester, these kids did learn something more, and so did I. Most importantly, I came upon a better core text than the dense, British-authored Penguin history we first used: Born in Blood and Fire: A Concise History of Latin America (New York: W. W. Norton, 2001) by John Charles Chasteen, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is (as far as I can tell) the best one volume study of Latin America available in American English. Also, there's a newer edition now out that brings things closer to the present. The first edition is divided into nine sections: Encounter, 1492-1600; Colonial Crucible, 1600-1810; Independence, 1810-1825; Postcolonial Blues, 1825-1850; Progress, 1850-1880; Neocolonialism, 1910-1945; Revolution, 1945-1960; Reaction, 1960-1990; and Neoliberalism, 1990-present. Each section has an interesting coda that Chasteen calls Countercurrents, adding to the richness of coverage. The introduction gives a nice overview and includes population statistics and other vital data. He lines up every Latin American country by area/physical size, then gives population estimates as of 1999. In order, largest-sized country to smallest (from p. 26):

Brazil 168 million
Argentina 36.6
Mexico 97.4
Peru 25.2
Colombia 41.6
Bolivia 8.1
Venezuela 23.7
Chile 15.0
Paraguay 5.4
Ecuador 12.4
Urigiay 3.3
Nicaragua 4.9
Cuba 11.2
Guatemala 11.1
Honduras 6.3
Panama 2.8
Costa Rica 3.9
Dominican Republic 8.4
El Salvador 6.2
Total Latin America 491.5
USA 276.2

Aside from history, we looked at art and architecture, listened to music, watched a few movies, and read some literary works. I tried to focus on Latin America in its own right, not merely in relation to the USA. It was great fun, and fascinating, and one student ended up going to Buenos Aires and reporting back. Hence, I'm delighted to have linked up with Luma of Brazil. Though there's a permanent link in the sidebar, here's another internal one to her lively and thoughtful blog: http://luzdeluma.blogspot.com/

Not sure for everyone else, but when I go to Luz de Luma over the internet, I can right-click on my mouse and then click on a command that will translate (roughly) into English, a cool feature, indeed. You may have noticed that I added a "Babelfish" Systran translator to my sidebar, as well. Of course, I welcome international traffic and am always delighted to hear from non-English speakers.

While I am advocating for Luma, I'd also like to point out three other very active, insightful and witty fellow Michigan, USA blogs. Jim, this one's for synergy! Let's see if we can really get something cooking here.

Michelle's Spell:
http://michellespells.blogspot.com/

Mme Cheri's Open, Remove, Swallow Dry:
http://shimmeringcheri.blogspot.com/

Jim's JR's Thumbprints:
http://jrtomlinson.blogspot.com/

Adios for now, Erik el Rojo

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