Race, Politics and Social Change Book

"This has sought to show how Afro-Latin Americans responded to the challenges, dilemmas, ordeals, and opportunities created by large-scale processes of economic and political development. In so doing, people of color helped forge a history of nation- and state-building, democratization, and social and political reform that transformed the life of the region."

" Quiero contarle mi hermano un pedacito de la historia negra, de la historia nuestra, caballero. " La Rebelion by Joe Arroyo.

This book was a very well written introduction to the history of Afro-Latinos in Latin America. It was written by a man who is pretty much one of THE preeminent scholars on the subject, George Reid Andrews. In this book, which states it is covering 200 years of history (though really it starts in the 1500s and ends around 2002) we see the often overlooked history of African-descended people who lived south of the Rio Grande. This is one of many books I have been reading and will continue to read as a part of the United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent. Though I know much about my own ethnicity (African-American), I have only since 2009-10 started to become interested in other ethnicities of African origin. Afro-Latinos are ,by far the largest Black ethnic group outside of Africa and a natural place to start.

The contrast between how enslaved Africans in Latin America and those in Anglo-North America responded to the hardships of life during and after slavery is interesting. The ways that increased numbers helped and possibly hindered Afro-Latinos was a revelation. I also really got to examine how the Latin American creation myth of "racial democracy" compared to the U.S.'s "melting pot" myth and has been such an effective tool in stopping Afro-Latinos from pushing for more civil rights, while simultaneously cementing the alliance of the Whites and well-off Mestizos as an organized polity.

I wish I could explore the many great facts that are in this book more: Brazil's "Great Emancipator" Emperor Pedro II, the deliberate decimation of many Afro-Argentines during the country's Independence and border wars, the impact that West Indian migration had on Central America, Mexico's Black generals during its independence struggle, the island of Hispaniola, and the extent that Black Power in the United States had in reinvigorating Afro-Latino culture throughout the region (just to name a few).

I had to accept the fact that as good as this book is, it is only an overview and one has to go further to get a more detailed view. Reid Andrews, for his part, has studied Brazil and Uruguay in particular. The bibliography and endnotes will also serve those who want a pre-21st century look at Afro-Latin America. This, of course, gets to other limitation of this (and all contemporary) historical work. Because it only goes to 2002, a lot of the political changes that have taken place since the turn of the millennium (specifically when Hugo Chavez, who gets a quick sentence, and the other "Bolivarians" came to power) is not accounted for. The use of social media and impact of interaction with African-American culture post-2000s is also absent. Reid Andrews did make some guesses at what the future of people will bring, but I can not say he could have imagined what is and what is still taking place (just a few months ago, in November/December 2015, Mexico started counting its Afro-Latino population after over a hundred of deliberately ignoring them).

"Racial politics, so much a part of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, will be with us well into the twenty-first century, and perhaps beyond. Would that it did not have to be so." - Last two sentences of book.