History looks at the past of the peoples and analyzes their development, but with the passage of time the history It can also be the object of study, and the comparison between the texts that throughout a certain period speak of the same thing can shed light on the perspective of an entire academic tradition.
This is part of what the book proposes “The Garden of Forking Paths: Twentieth-Century American Historiographical Scenario on Latin America”that the historian Lucrecia Solano will present this Thursday, sharp at 7:30 p.m., at the La Besana Cultural Center.
“This research is the product of my years of study at the University of Houston, in Texas. I was doing a second doctorate and I was discovering countless things that were unknown to me at that time, even having studied the doctorate here in Mexico”, explained the author in an interview with VANGUARDIA.
“I did an analysis of the writing of history through the 20th century. I make a history of history. I am linking the texts written on a specific subject, I am linking it with another writing made after a few years. Am relating to each other on the same subject but at different historical moments”, he stressed.
Solano made it clear that it is about “different looks”, and that no judgment is proposed in this regard. They are not good or bad, or worse or better than the current positions, especially in relation to the US vision of Latin America.
“One of the things that caught my attention the most is the difference in the meaning of the same concept, handling it in Mexico, in some country of Latin America, or in the United States. The one I refer to in the book is the concept of race, but there are many others,” he said.
“For Americans, the concept of race does not necessarily have to do with genetics. They talk about a latin race, for example. We are talking about a Latino race, which doesn’t make any sense to us, because being Latino is living in a country where a language derived from Latin is spoken. Being Latino has nothing to do with race, but with the geographical situation”, he added.
The author also exemplified the concept of populism, which a few years ago, she recalled, caused an awkward moment among presidents. Barack Obama and Enrique Pena Nieto when the latter referred to the matter in a pejorative way.
IT MAY INTEREST YOU: The famous Mexican playwright Luisa Josefina Hernández dies at the age of 94
“Obama even got upset, and said that populism is giving people what they need, generating public policies, and so on. He gave an expression that has nothing to do with the meaning that we give to populism, ”he mentioned.
Lucrecia Solano will expand the information that this book raises in the presentation, where copies will also be available for purchase. It can also be purchased through Amazon.
