Week 13: Towards an Uncertain Future

For this week’s blog “Towards an Uncertain Future”, instead of writing about and analyzing the readings from Alexander Dawson’s texts, I’m choosing to focus on a conversation with Max Cameron, a Political Science professor at UBC, from a clip called The Left Turns. In this video, Cameron touches base on many issues (his examples particularly

Week 12: Speaking Truth to Power

This week our class is covering the topic “Speaking Truth to Power”. Alexander Dawson makes note of several important events, topics, people, and groups, but for this week’s post, I would like to focus on one group in particular who I am always drawn to every time they are brought up in conversation or in

“Casta Painting and the Characterization of Colonial Mexican Identities” by Natalia Caldas

The second source I chose to write about for this week’s writing assignment is “Casta Painting and the Characterization of Colonial Mexican Identities” by Natalia Caldas of the University of Western Ontario. In the second chapter, which is the one I will be mainly focusing on, Caldas’ focus is mainly on the español character in

Bartolomé de las Casas: A SHORT ACCOUNT OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE INDIES

The first source I chose to write about is “Bartolomé de las Casas: A SHORT ACCOUNT OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE INDIES”, written in 1542 and published in 1552, but more specifically, the abbreviated version written by Franklin W. Knight and Andrew Hurley. Now although my course is only excerpts of las Casas’ account of

Week 11: The Terror

This week our lecture and the accompanying readings focus on the topic of terror in Latin America. As expressed by Alexander Dawson Latin America has had a very long history of torture and extrajudicial killings, going all the way back to the sixteenth century, when colonizers began their conquests of the Americas. He argues that

Week 10: Power to the People

This week, our lecture “Power to the People” focuses mainly on the topic of populism and just what that means exactly. Populism, and what it means to be a populist, is such a widely debated term with a very vague and unsatisfying answer; As stated by Professor Beasley-Murray, populism is something that “is not easy

Week 9: “Commerce, Coercion, and America’s Empire”

The theme of this week’s lesson “Commerce, Coercion, and America’s Empire” was the relationship between Latin America and the United States, and the stereotypes and exploitation of Latin American nations on behalf of the US. This conflict and these issues are perpetuated by many factors including misinformation or representation, abuse of power, and the stereotypes

Week 8: Signs of Crisis in a Gilded Age

This week’s lecture “Signs of Crisis in a Gilded Age” mainly focuses on the poem “To Roosevelt” (the original Spanish title being “A Roosevelt”) by Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío, and the differences between Latin America and the United States. For this week’s blog post, I would like to focus on the question “What emotions of

Week 7: The Export Boom as Modernity

In this week’s lecture video “The Export Boom as Modernity”, Professor Beasley-Murray explains how the process of modernity affects different societies, and different parts of the same society, in different ways and to different extents. For this week’s blogpost, I would like to focus mostly on the questions asked halfway through the video which are

Week 6: Citizenship and Rights in the New Republics

This week’s lecture of “Citizenship and Rights in the New Republics” covers events and concepts that I was fairly familiar with beforehand. Some very important notes from topics that were covered overall include race as a social construct that is not easily deconstructed, and the lasting effects and results of slavery and emancipation to this