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North from Mexico: The Spanish-Speaking People of the United States
Carey McWilliam's North From Mexico , first published in 1949, is a classic survey of Chicano history that continues to have a major influence on studies of the Mexican-American experience today. Widely used in college courses on Chicano and Southwestern history and culture, the volume provides a comprehensive general history of the Mexican experience in the United States, beginning with the early aboriginal inhabitants. Now fully updated by Matt S. Meier to cover the period 1945 through 1988, North From Mexico explores all aspects of the Chicano experience in the United States including family, employment, education, assimilation, political, cultural, and economic issues. Particularly valuable is the inclusion of current statistical and census data on immigration patterns, educational and voting characteristics, and social and economic trends in the Hispanic population. Material new to this edition includes an overview of the development of Mexican-American organizations and leaders and the struggle for greater acceptance in American society that has characterized the Mexican-American experience in recent decades. Particular attention is focused on the movimiento, the movement for civil and political equality with other Americans. Meier stresses the cultural aspects of the movement and profiles key leaders. Among the other issues central to the Mexican-American experience since 1945 which receive detailed coverage are the immigration and naturalization of Mexicans, the social and economic role of undocumented workers from Mexico, and the effects of the Simpson-Rodino Immigration Reform and Control Act. Meier also contrasts the considerable achievements of Mexican-Americans in the political and cultural spheres with the persistently high rates of unemployment and poverty that continue to plague the Hispanic population. With the addition of Meier's perceptive analysis of the past four decades, North From Mexico stands once again as the definitive source on the historical experience of Chicanos in the United States.
- GenresHistoryNonfiction
372 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1969
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About the author
Carey McWilliams
76 books15 followersFather of Wilson Carey McWilliams/Carey McWilliams Jr.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
November 13, 2017
Put simply, I’m in complete awe of this book, and especially with its author. As it turns out, I am not the only one to hold this sentiment. For, it appears that McWilliams tends to have this general effect upon people with nearly anything he writes. I can now honestly lament the fact that it has taken this long for me to read him.
However, this is not really my fault as I’m more of an opportunist when it comes to reading and I normally just take what comes my way that happens to be along my interests. Although I’ve been long familiar with his name and reputation, many of McWilliams books are not kept in print with current editions so they are extremely hard to come by. The primary reason for this is not from any lack of popularity or favor but largely because the majority of his writing is non-fiction and several decades old at this point.
So, I can only imagine that somehow the prevailing consensus amongst publishers must be that he is too outdated to be bothered with. This is understandable to a degree, but in his case I think this might be a misguided premise. There are a few anthologies out there that collect his best work together, as well as include him along him with other writers on certain topics, mainly that dealing with California. Only, if his other books are anywhere near as good as this one then these should only be seen as introductions to the man and all of his books should be brought out in new editions NOW!
Although, I might be slightly overstating the case here, I feel this particular book is positive proof of all that I claim here. Initially published in 1948, this also happens to be the very first work to be written on the subject of “Spanish-Speaking People of the United States.” Amazingly, until Carey came along, no one had ever thought to devote any coverage to the ethnic history of these people. Not only does this make it a landmark event worth preserving, it also holds up to every expectation as to what one would want from such a book on this subject and then surpasses them.
It’s an incredible work of genius in many ways and it comes across as if it were written effortlessly. The only serious drawback in this book is that it’s coverage ends with the dawning of the nuclear age. The re-issuing of this “new” edition has attempted to rectify this by having another author fill in the gaps left out in the original to try to bring it up to date.
However, despite being an extremely welcome idea and one for which I’m most grateful for, since it was only through this new edition that I was able to find a copy, it actually fails to hold much worth from the effort. Not from a lack of trying naturally but solely because following up in McWilliams footsteps is a hard act to follow and something of an unenviable position to be in. The first sixteen chapters of this edition comprise the original 1948 book and Professor Matt S. Meier authored the last three. Despite being the sole reason as to why this edition was printed I would highly recommend to skip these last chapters completely.
This may sound overly harsh but I challenge anyone to read the whole thing through and not find the jarring difference between these two authors. In my opinion, these newer chapters should have been relegated to an appendix rather than included as belonging to the actual text of the book. It’s not that they aren’t relevant or important it’s just that after reading McWilliams writing these last chapters just come across as merely being lists of people, places and events that occurred in a somewhat jumbled and haphazard fashion. It makes for painfully boring reading for the general reader and surely was only aimed at the bare necessity of making it current for the needs of the college student. To whom I wish all the best of luck in staying awake long enough to get through these, as brief and to the point that they are.
Essentially, McWilliams is one of those rare historians that stands alone by himself in a class of his own. The reasons why this is should be abundantly clear to any reader and are too numerous for me to completely recount but I will bring up just a few here. Overall, McWilliams takes a sprawling and many faceted subject and seems to make it effortlessly clear. He primarily focuses on the Southwestern territories of the United States that were originally part of Mexico; those of California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Of course, he does not neglect the other settled regions of the country but concentrates his attention mainly on this particular region as being where the culture has maintained its integrity the longest.
He sketches a brief history of these territories early settlement to illustrate their individual characteristics, all of which play a part in how they later adapted to the changes made once they were part of the US. In this way, McWilliams also nearly comes awfully close to making Jared Diamond’s famous premise that stated that cultural migrations predominantly took hold only by traveling laterally from east to west. He does this by noting that each original settlement of Mexico in these northern regions were all completely isolated from one another. The geographical landscape between these future states was the main factor as to their remaining apart from one another but there were equally many economic and sociological ones as well. Although, McWilliams does not pose the “what if’ scenario it becomes clear that had this region been united as a cohesive whole, the United States could very well have had a much tougher time in acquiring these territories.
McWilliams not only relays the most pertinent historical facts in an organized and methodical manner but he also provides sound reasoning as to some of the inherent causes of contentious rifts between the Anglo, Latin and Indian cultures that still exist in some form or another to this very day. In this way, his sympathetic accounting of these facts tends to lean towards addressing the underlying reasons behinds these social ills that in their own quiet way seem to be trying to bridge these gaps in hopes of potentially alleviating some of them.
Overall, he does this all in a fair and measured manner without having to resort to preaching any sermons. That is until he becomes personally involved in the story, in which for his day he actually played a major role. This occurs in the early 1940s with the notorious “Sleepy Lagoon” incident as well as with the “Zoot Suit Riots.” Here, McWilliams involved himself actively as a lawyer in the defense of those accused of crimes that history has shown to have been purely racially biased and motivated.
When writing about these particular incidents his language and manner of relaying these events reveal a rather forceful and strong bias, often in an extremely sarcastic way. Although, something of a cardinal sin for a historian, I, for one, can forgive him these rants as I believe he deserves to have his say in any way he sees fit because his ultimate reward for these valiant efforts was to be branded as a communist and brought before the “House of Un-American Committee.” Many a lesser individual were humbled before this massive witch hunt but not Carey, a near decade after these events took place and he was writing this book he still seems to be boiling with rage…and rightly so in my opinion.
Taken as a whole, Carey McWilliams’ masterful thoroughness on this subject is only matched by his equal thoughtfulness here. In the foreword of this book he muses over how to precisely define the subject of his book. Are they Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, Indians or Hispanic? Although there could be made a case for a general consensus for one or more of these groups, none of these are broad enough to truly encompass the scope of the myriad strains of cultures that make up these people. It is a problem that exists to this very day. No one seems to be able to come up with a satisfactory blanket term that everyone can agree on and there are various reasons why some people take offense to many of those suggested. The fact that McWilliams is aware enough to address this at the very outset goes to show how much care he took in his approach.
He also shows himself to be a rather prophetic as to where the “Spanish-Speaking People” were headed in this country. He accurately predicted that their numbers would one day grow large enough to eventually supplant those of European descent and with it wield a growing political power. Whether they would properly utilize this potential or not was something he foresaw as well.
On the whole, Carey McWilliams’ assessment on these and many other things rings truer today than many contemporary treatments of the same material. Having read a great man of these recently published books on this exact subject I can honestly state that I learned far more in his “outdated” one than many of these taken altogether. I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in this subject wholeheartedly. This is a stunning achievement for a poor white Colorado farm boy and deserves to be read by a much wider audience, as well as properly updated by someone worthy of the man’s talents. Hopefully, that day will come soon.
However, this is not really my fault as I’m more of an opportunist when it comes to reading and I normally just take what comes my way that happens to be along my interests. Although I’ve been long familiar with his name and reputation, many of McWilliams books are not kept in print with current editions so they are extremely hard to come by. The primary reason for this is not from any lack of popularity or favor but largely because the majority of his writing is non-fiction and several decades old at this point.
So, I can only imagine that somehow the prevailing consensus amongst publishers must be that he is too outdated to be bothered with. This is understandable to a degree, but in his case I think this might be a misguided premise. There are a few anthologies out there that collect his best work together, as well as include him along him with other writers on certain topics, mainly that dealing with California. Only, if his other books are anywhere near as good as this one then these should only be seen as introductions to the man and all of his books should be brought out in new editions NOW!
Although, I might be slightly overstating the case here, I feel this particular book is positive proof of all that I claim here. Initially published in 1948, this also happens to be the very first work to be written on the subject of “Spanish-Speaking People of the United States.” Amazingly, until Carey came along, no one had ever thought to devote any coverage to the ethnic history of these people. Not only does this make it a landmark event worth preserving, it also holds up to every expectation as to what one would want from such a book on this subject and then surpasses them.
It’s an incredible work of genius in many ways and it comes across as if it were written effortlessly. The only serious drawback in this book is that it’s coverage ends with the dawning of the nuclear age. The re-issuing of this “new” edition has attempted to rectify this by having another author fill in the gaps left out in the original to try to bring it up to date.
However, despite being an extremely welcome idea and one for which I’m most grateful for, since it was only through this new edition that I was able to find a copy, it actually fails to hold much worth from the effort. Not from a lack of trying naturally but solely because following up in McWilliams footsteps is a hard act to follow and something of an unenviable position to be in. The first sixteen chapters of this edition comprise the original 1948 book and Professor Matt S. Meier authored the last three. Despite being the sole reason as to why this edition was printed I would highly recommend to skip these last chapters completely.
This may sound overly harsh but I challenge anyone to read the whole thing through and not find the jarring difference between these two authors. In my opinion, these newer chapters should have been relegated to an appendix rather than included as belonging to the actual text of the book. It’s not that they aren’t relevant or important it’s just that after reading McWilliams writing these last chapters just come across as merely being lists of people, places and events that occurred in a somewhat jumbled and haphazard fashion. It makes for painfully boring reading for the general reader and surely was only aimed at the bare necessity of making it current for the needs of the college student. To whom I wish all the best of luck in staying awake long enough to get through these, as brief and to the point that they are.
Essentially, McWilliams is one of those rare historians that stands alone by himself in a class of his own. The reasons why this is should be abundantly clear to any reader and are too numerous for me to completely recount but I will bring up just a few here. Overall, McWilliams takes a sprawling and many faceted subject and seems to make it effortlessly clear. He primarily focuses on the Southwestern territories of the United States that were originally part of Mexico; those of California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Of course, he does not neglect the other settled regions of the country but concentrates his attention mainly on this particular region as being where the culture has maintained its integrity the longest.
He sketches a brief history of these territories early settlement to illustrate their individual characteristics, all of which play a part in how they later adapted to the changes made once they were part of the US. In this way, McWilliams also nearly comes awfully close to making Jared Diamond’s famous premise that stated that cultural migrations predominantly took hold only by traveling laterally from east to west. He does this by noting that each original settlement of Mexico in these northern regions were all completely isolated from one another. The geographical landscape between these future states was the main factor as to their remaining apart from one another but there were equally many economic and sociological ones as well. Although, McWilliams does not pose the “what if’ scenario it becomes clear that had this region been united as a cohesive whole, the United States could very well have had a much tougher time in acquiring these territories.
McWilliams not only relays the most pertinent historical facts in an organized and methodical manner but he also provides sound reasoning as to some of the inherent causes of contentious rifts between the Anglo, Latin and Indian cultures that still exist in some form or another to this very day. In this way, his sympathetic accounting of these facts tends to lean towards addressing the underlying reasons behinds these social ills that in their own quiet way seem to be trying to bridge these gaps in hopes of potentially alleviating some of them.
Overall, he does this all in a fair and measured manner without having to resort to preaching any sermons. That is until he becomes personally involved in the story, in which for his day he actually played a major role. This occurs in the early 1940s with the notorious “Sleepy Lagoon” incident as well as with the “Zoot Suit Riots.” Here, McWilliams involved himself actively as a lawyer in the defense of those accused of crimes that history has shown to have been purely racially biased and motivated.
When writing about these particular incidents his language and manner of relaying these events reveal a rather forceful and strong bias, often in an extremely sarcastic way. Although, something of a cardinal sin for a historian, I, for one, can forgive him these rants as I believe he deserves to have his say in any way he sees fit because his ultimate reward for these valiant efforts was to be branded as a communist and brought before the “House of Un-American Committee.” Many a lesser individual were humbled before this massive witch hunt but not Carey, a near decade after these events took place and he was writing this book he still seems to be boiling with rage…and rightly so in my opinion.
Taken as a whole, Carey McWilliams’ masterful thoroughness on this subject is only matched by his equal thoughtfulness here. In the foreword of this book he muses over how to precisely define the subject of his book. Are they Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, Indians or Hispanic? Although there could be made a case for a general consensus for one or more of these groups, none of these are broad enough to truly encompass the scope of the myriad strains of cultures that make up these people. It is a problem that exists to this very day. No one seems to be able to come up with a satisfactory blanket term that everyone can agree on and there are various reasons why some people take offense to many of those suggested. The fact that McWilliams is aware enough to address this at the very outset goes to show how much care he took in his approach.
He also shows himself to be a rather prophetic as to where the “Spanish-Speaking People” were headed in this country. He accurately predicted that their numbers would one day grow large enough to eventually supplant those of European descent and with it wield a growing political power. Whether they would properly utilize this potential or not was something he foresaw as well.
On the whole, Carey McWilliams’ assessment on these and many other things rings truer today than many contemporary treatments of the same material. Having read a great man of these recently published books on this exact subject I can honestly state that I learned far more in his “outdated” one than many of these taken altogether. I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in this subject wholeheartedly. This is a stunning achievement for a poor white Colorado farm boy and deserves to be read by a much wider audience, as well as properly updated by someone worthy of the man’s talents. Hopefully, that day will come soon.
February 14, 2023
The story of multiple sets twin cities over a 2,000 mile stretch separated by a contested line sets the stage for the passage, connection and controversy. Culture, dignity, family and dreams are the corner stone of a dynamic and diverse story of the Spanish speaking people of the United States. Born and raised in Texas, I learned more about our southern neighbor in the last 10 days than I ever did in years of World, country and state history courses.
April 6, 2020
Truly an essential text for anyone who wants to understand the rich, varied, and complex historical and cultural significance of Spanish-speaking people in the U.S. It's also a pleasure to read. A resource I will continue to return to for many years to come.
September 3, 2023
Eh... McWilliams makes good points about migration from Mexico and all the great things Mexicans did and their lives in the U.S., but it often feels like it's just point1-explanation-point2-elaboration-etc., rather than having a flow to it.
... Now I'm much further into it, and the text within each chapter seems to flow better (overall). Still some staccato-ness at times, but overall better.
The added chapters by Matt Meier and Alma Garcia help round out and update the story. (But they could also use some additional editing: sentences that have words repeated, sentences that contradict each other, commas in strange places, incorrect federal department names, ...)
The book HEAVILY focuses on the U.S. southwest, though, and I wish it talked more about Spanish-speaking people of the rest of the United States, too.
... Now I'm much further into it, and the text within each chapter seems to flow better (overall). Still some staccato-ness at times, but overall better.
The added chapters by Matt Meier and Alma Garcia help round out and update the story. (But they could also use some additional editing: sentences that have words repeated, sentences that contradict each other, commas in strange places, incorrect federal department names, ...)
The book HEAVILY focuses on the U.S. southwest, though, and I wish it talked more about Spanish-speaking people of the rest of the United States, too.
November 22, 2015
HIST 8980: Hawes; Thematic Studies; Fall 2005
very hung up on proper name for Mexicans. Latinos? Chicanos? etc. Details US/Mex relationship from conquest to present (1968) No mention of legal action except for Westminster. Discusses religion, work, family.
very hung up on proper name for Mexicans. Latinos? Chicanos? etc. Details US/Mex relationship from conquest to present (1968) No mention of legal action except for Westminster. Discusses religion, work, family.
August 15, 2008
wonderful
January 29, 2016
Leaned a great deal about the history of the Mexican people and their experience in what is now the American Southwest.
Currently reading
November 20, 2010So far, this book is really good. Does not read like a novel but author able to give enough lively info to make it enjoyable.
April 27, 2014
It was written 50 years ago, but still a must-read for anyone looking to fully understand U.S. history or present-day immigration issues.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews