Course Description
This course explores crucial issues in the history of Latin America, from the Independence period through the present. This course will expose the class to a range of people, movements, ideologies, and events, which will allow students to critically examine the causes and outcomes of revolution and counterrevolution in Latin America, 1800-Present. Intimately tied to this history, the class will critically examine the role of the United States in Latin America, both as imperial actor and a destination for refugees fleeing instability catalyzed by both foreign and domestic factors.
By the end of the semester, students should be able to articulate motivations of various actors in major events studied in the course. They should be able to trace historic patterns across the region, while also identifying seminal moments that altered the trajectory of peoples, nations, regions, and/or the global community. By the end of this course undergraduates should grasp the ways geopolitical strategies, nationalist movements, and transnational struggles have radically altered both past and present realities for the people of Latin America. Finally, students should be able to evaluate the various lenses of Latin American history and demonstrate their own ability to analyze the region over the past two-hundred years.
Prerequisites/CoRequisites
No prerequisites for this course
Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
- Identify and apply the key historical concepts of change-over-time, cause-and-effect, agency, historical empathy, and continuity and discontinuity, and recognize how these concepts are employed in the historical method.
- Analyze and interpret primary sources with attention to audience, authorship and context.
- Recognize some of the ways in which historians have conflicting interpretations of the past.
- Recognize how and why Latin American revolutions and counterrevolutions have been taught differently to different generations and communities.
- Identify and discuss the importance of struggles for economic, political, and social justice in Latin America.
- Analyze the relationship between U.S. Empire and immigration from Latin America.
- Produce a paper with a clear thesis and appropriate citations based on strong evidence drawn from historical sources.
Suggested Course Materials
All texts are either open access or digitally available through CUNY One Search.
Secondary Sources
“A Brief History of the U.S. Interferences in the Caribbean Basin” Telesur (2019)
Buchenau, Jürgen “The Mexican Revolution, 1910-1946” Latin American History (2015)
Burnett, John “A Chapter in U.S. History Often Ignored: The Flight of Runaway Slaves to Mexico” NPR (2021)
Burns, E. Bradford “The True Verdict on Allende” The Nation (2009)
Danticat, Edwidge “The Long Legacy of Occupation in Haiti” The New Yorker (2015)
Day, Meredith Revolution and Independence in Latin America: The Liberators (New York, NY: Rosen Publishing Group, 2015)
ISBN: 9781680480313
Deans-Smith, Susan “Casta Paintings” Not Even Past (2011)
Eddins, Crystal Nicole “Runaways, Repertoires, and Repression: Marronnage and the Haitian Revolution, 1766-1791” Vol 25, No 1, Journal of Haitian Studies (2019)
Estas, Roberta, “Las Castas – Spanish Racial Classifications” Native Heritage Project (2013)
Finesurrey, Samuel “Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society” OER Commons (2022)
_________, “Contesting Circuits of Empire: Afro-Caribbean Migrant Labor in Cuba, 1899-1958” Academic Works(2020)
Hirst, Stephen K., and Heather Jasper “The Indigenous Rebellion That Inspired Peru’s Independence” BBC (2021)
Lantigua-Williams, Juleyka “40 Years Later, U.S. Invasion Still Haunts Dominican Republic” The Progressive Magazine (2005)
Lopez, German “How the War on Drugs Perpetuates Violence in Latin America” VOX (2014)
Lynch, John Latin America Between Colony and Nation (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan 2003)
ISBN: 9781349418565
McPherson, Alan A Short History of U.S. Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean (Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016)
ISBN: 9781118953990
McSherry, J. Patrice “Operation Condor and Transnational State Violence Against Exiles” Vol 36, No 2 Journal of Global South Students (2019)
Miller, Bonnie From Liberation to Conquest: The Visual and Popular Cultures of the Spanish-American War of 1898 (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2011)
ISBN: 9781558499249
Murphy, John Ed. Gods and Goddesses of the Inca, Maya, and Aztec Civilization (New York, NY: Rosen Publishing Group, 2015)
ISBN: 9781622753970
Portillo Villeda, Suyapa “The Root Cause of Central American Migration is U.S. Imperialism” Jacobin (2021)
The John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress, “How Mexican Immigration to the U.S. Has Evolved” Time (2015)
The Rise of Allende: An Interview with Marian Schlotterbeck, The Tribune (2020)
Primary Sources
Bartolomé de las Casas, A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies (1584)
The Haitian Declaration of Independence (1804)
Simón Bolívar, Letter from Jamaica (1815)
Mexico’s Plan de Iguala (1821)
Cuba’s Platt Amendment (1903)
Emiliano Zapata, Plan de Ayala (1911)
Suggested Course Assignments and Grading
|
A+ |
4.0 |
97-100% |
|
A |
4.0 |
93-96.9% |
|
A- |
3.7 |
90-92.9% |
|
B+ |
3.3 |
87-89.9% |
|
B |
3.0 |
83-86.9% |
|
B- |
2.7 |
80-82.9% |
|
C+ |
2.3 |
77-79.9% |
|
C |
2.0 |
73-76.9% |
|
C- |
1.7 |
70-72.9% |
|
D+ |
1.3 |
67-69.9% |
|
D (passing) |
1.0 |
60-66.9% |
|
F |
0 |
0-59.9% |
|
NC* |
Not calculated |
0-59.9% |
Weekly Assignments (30 Percent): Every week there will be a set of graded assignments on the readings due Sunday at midnight. You will submit your notes on the assigned materials and write a paragraph response to each discussion question.
Historical Fiction Paper (20 Percent): You will submit a five-page paper where you create a narrative about a fictional figure living through real events learned about in this class. You are encouraged to be creative with this assignment, however, you will be evaluated both on your writing clarity and on how closely the narrative matches the realities of the time. The character you choose must comment or participate in at least three events learned from this class.
Final Paper (20 Percent): You will submit a 5–8-page final paper where you will compose a historical argument based on a pattern you have identified in Latin American History. You are encouraged to build off the research conducted for your historical fiction essay. You will use and cite lecture notes and assigned materials, as well as primary and secondary sources you uncover on your own, to support your argument.
Final Exam (20 Percent): The final exam will consist of short answers and a single essay.
Participation (10 Percent): You are expected to attend and participate in class discussions.
Suggested Course Schedule with Possible Assigned Readings
|
Week |
Topic |
Assignment |
Due |
|
1 |
Class One: Introduction
Class Two: Contact and Conquest, Genocide and Resistance |
1. Revolutions and Independence in Latin America: 2. Gods and Goddess of the Inca Maya and Aztec Civilizations: 3. Bartolomé de las Casas: 4. Latin America between Colony and Nation: Chapter Two: Arms and Men in the Spanish Conquest of America 5. Crash Course History: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
2 |
Class Three: The Social Order in Colonial Latin America
Class Four: Túpac Amaru II and the Cracking of the Spanish Empire |
1. Revolutions and Independence in Latin America: 2. Not Even Past: 3. Native Heritage Project: 4. British Broadcast Chanel: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
3 |
Class Five: The Transatlantic Slave Trade in Latin America
Class Six: The Haitian Revolution |
1. Journal of Haitian Studies: 2. The Haitian Declaration of Independence (1804) 3. Crash Course History: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
4 |
Class Seven: South American Wars of Independence
Class Eight: The Mexican Wars of Independence |
1. Revolutions and Independence in Latin America: 2. Simón Bolívar: 4. National Public Radio: 5. Crash Course History: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
5 |
Class Nine: Nation Building in Latin America
Class Ten: The Mexican American War |
1. Revolutions and Independence in Latin America: 2. A Short History of U.S. Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean: 3. Crash Course History: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
6 |
Class Eleven: The Cuban Wars of Independence and the War of 1898
Class Twelve: The Mexican Revolution |
1. From Liberation to Conquest: 2. A Short History of U.S. Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean: 3. Latin American History: 4. Emiliano Zapata:
|
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
7 |
Class Thirteen: Early 20th Century U.S. Occupations in the Caribbean Basin
Class Fourteen: The Rise of U.S. Backed Strong Men |
1. From Liberation to Conquest: 3. Telesur:
|
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
8 |
Class Fifteen: Haiti and the Dominican Republic – From Occupation to Immigration
Class Sixteen: The Cuban Revolution |
1. Academic Works: 2. The New Yorkers: 3. The Progressive Magazine: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response
|
|
9 |
Class Seventeen: Allende and the Democratic Path to Socialism
Class Eighteen: Dirty Wars in the Southern Cone |
1. Tribune: 2. The Nation: 3. Journal of Global South Studies: Operation Condor and Transnational State Violence Against Exiles |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response
|
|
10 |
Class Nineteen: Braceros, Farmworkers and Guest Worker Visas
Class Twenty: The War on Drugs in Latin America |
1. A Short History of U.S. Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean: 2. Vox: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response 3) Historical Fiction Essay Due
|
|
11 |
Class Twenty-One: Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Central America
Class Twenty-Two: Immigration from Central America |
1. A Short History of U.S. Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean: 2. Jacobin: |
1) Reading Notes 2) Discussion Response |
|
12 |
Class Twenty-Three: Final Review |
|
1) Final Paper Due
|
| 13 | Final Exam | ||
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