This study provides a first approach to the economic and social history of the Valley of Tulancingo in the late colonial period. In examining the development of this agricultural area of central Mexico, the author discusses the broader transformations that affected the country as a whole during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries: population growth, migration, urbanization, and the commercialization of agriculture. On this score, the study participates in the current debate on the best way to characterize the Mexican agricultural sector at the end of the colonial rule. Most modern historiography tends to emphasize that demographic growth transformed the traditional balance between population and resources and was a major cause of economic and social disruption in the countryside. The author combines new evidence with recent findings from the specialist literature, to argue that Tulancingo fully participated in the roster of economic and social changes of the period. The work begins with a description of Tulancingo's population trends and an analysis of the spatial distribution of the population. It goes on with an analysis of the Valley's agricultural economy, describing the complementary rural elements of Indian communities and haciendas, and examining a series of related transformations in landholding, marketing, and social relations. This study will be of interest to anyone concerned with Mexican economic and social history, or the history of agriculture.

This research was prompted by the questions 'What is being Chilean?, Who are tile Chileans? Do all those born in the country feel the same about their nationality and about their fellow nationals? A large number of Chileans will describe their country as culturally and ethnically homogenous, probably because they do not include the native peoples in their description; least of all would they acknowledge that mestizo blood runs in their veins. Therefore, my objective has been to deconstruct the myth homogeneity in the Chilean identity. Moreover, this research, which started as an exploration into tile complex terrain of tile Chilean identity, finally turned into a rather painful soul-searching process. It is obvious that having been born in Chile, it was impossible for me not to become involved, not to feel touched more than once, not to feel guilty more than once. The identities of the indigenous peoples and the descendants of Spanish colonisers have been profoundly transformed during 500 years of social, cultural and political change. Tile rise of the nations states and tile construction of national identities after the wars of Independence were key moments for Latin America, but although no longer tinder colonial rule, the social and cultural differences between 'Indians' and Spaniards continued into the republic, based on the imagined superiority of the Spanish culture, language and religion. Currently Chile, where in recent times - and in the past as well - the military played a crucial role, is in a process of globalisation and reconstruction of the national identity. The research was framed by the understanding that the imagined community of the nation is formed by 'us' and 'them', and a distinction which does not indicate a binary opposition but a complex articulation which both supports and fractures tile nation. In the imagined community of tile Chilean nation identities are multiple and cultures are multiple too. They are constituted in relation to dimensions such as history, place and culture. Geography, in Chile, is also a defining marker of national identity that does not imply inert geography, but an essential dimension in the cultural and social dynamics of tile nation. I challenge the view, long sustained by many Chileans that their country is culturally and ethnically homogeneous. In order to achieve this end I explore the 'skeleton in the cupboard' of the Chilean identity, that is to say, their mestizo origin. With that objective in mind, this research was conceived as a contribution to make Chileans come to terms with the fact that they have some amount of 'Indian' blood in their veins. Only when they are able to take that step, will they be able to appreciate and take pride in the ancient cultures they descend from because in that way they will shed light into that dark comer of their identity. National communities are not only in people's heads or in the imagination of a nation of citizens, but are projected and articulated through channels like the media and educational practice; they are also embodied and practised. From the moment that identity is conceived, not as a fixed ethos formed in a remote past, but as a future project, Chileans great challenge now is to define what they want to be. There may be different projects, alternative proposals and different versions of national identity that will lead on to different roads, but they must include a notion of collective identity that is open to alterity, invention and transgression and also a diversity that Chileans have so far refused to accept.

This study examines what effect the presence of the Chinese in the West Indies had on understandings of belonging in terms of nation. It examines the construction of the category "Chinese" across different modes, particularly literary texts, from the nineteenth century to the present, and from the positions of colonial, creole and Chinese spaces. The results of this research challenge the common view that the Chinese have had a marginal impact on the perception of nationhood in the West Indies. Instead, images of the Chinese were, and continue to be, a key means of exploring the ambiguities, potentialities and limitations of nation as it developed in the West Indies. In particular, they reveal that neither "nation" nor "belonging" are static positions; rather, they signify continuing renegotiations of power relationships and cultural identities. Several factors impact on representations of the Chinese. In the nineteenth century, such images were molded by the specific aims of colonial enterprises, entangled at the intersection of the discursive constructs of "East" and "West" during a period of mass migrations and the peculiar tensions of post-emancipation West Indian societies. In the twentieth century, "the Chinese" have been created in response to a need to assert ownership of what was once colonised space and to perform nation before a global audience. Of late, Chinese West Indians have taken a more visibly active role in the construction and dissemination of images of themselves and their communities. In the process they have sometimes radically redefined the imaginative nation space of the West Indies and, in the process, challenge established boundaries of belonging, and contest "belonging" itself.

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 165-181).

Thesis (M.L.S.)--University of Texas.

Thesis--Tekniska Högskolan, Stockholm. / At head of title: Library and Institute of Ibero-American studies, Stockholm. Extra t.p., with thesis statement, inserted. Bibliography: p. 229-241.

Thesis (M.L.S.)--University of Texas.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universidad de Sevilla. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 273-283).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Purdue University, 1990. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 310-329).