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This book opens new dimensions on race in Latin America by examining the extreme caste groups of colonial Mexico. In tracing their experiences, a broader understanding of the connection between mestizaje (Latin America's modern ideology of racial mixture) and the colonial caste system is rendered. Before mestizaje emerged as a primary concept in Latin America, an earlier precursor existed that must be taken seriously. This colonial form of racial hybridity, encased in an elastic caste system, allowed some people to live through multiple racial lives. Hence, the great fusion of races that swept Latin America and defined its modernity, carries an important corollary. Mestizaje, when viewed at its roots, is not just about mixture, but also about dissecting and reconnecting lives. Such experiences may have carved a special ability for some Latin American populations to reach across racial groups to relate with and understand multiple racial perspectives. This overlooked, deep history of mestizaje is a legacy that can be built upon in modern times.
'This is a brilliant book. Meticulously researched, cogently argued, and beautifully written, it insightfully explores the myriad ways in which the problem of racial diversity profoundly affected not only the Spanish colonial reality but also the Spanish imperial psyche.'
Franklin W. Knight - The Johns Hopkins University
'Before Mestizaje is a richly layered and sophisticated account of the meanings and practices surrounding race and difference in colonial Mexico, and a model for understanding the intersections of law, economy, and cultural practices in the constitution of a social order.'
Laurent Dubois - Duke University, North Carolina, author of Haiti: The Aftershocks of History
'Before Mestizaje is a major contribution to an increasingly sophisticated literature about racial mixture in colonial Latin America with its critical scrutiny of the 'sistema de castas' and the political, legal, social, and cultural variables that shaped its development.'
Susan Deans-Smith Source: The Journal of Interdisciplinary History
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