What do you think?
Rate this book
The United States and Latin America: Myths and Stereotypes of Civilization and Nature
The lazy greaser asleep under a sombrero and the avaricious gringo with money-stuffed pockets are only two of the negative stereotypes that North Americans and Latin Americans have cherished during several centuries of mutual misunderstanding. This unique study probes the origins of these stereotypes and myths and explores how they have shaped North American impressions of Latin America from the time of the Pilgrims up to the end of the twentieth century. Fredrick Pike's central thesis is that North Americans have identified themselves with "civilization" in all its manifestations, while viewing Latin Americans as hopelessly trapped in primitivism, the victims of nature rather than its masters. He shows how this civilization-nature duality arose from the first European settlers' perception that nature—and everything identified with it, including American Indians, African slaves, all women, and all children—was something to be conquered and dominated. This myth eventually came to color the North American establishment view of both immigrants to the United States and all our neighbors to the south.
464 pages, Paperback
First published November 30, 1991
11 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
March 14, 2015
Published by the Texas University Press and clearly intended for academic studies, this may not exactly be riveting reading for everyone but I don’t think it is too inaccessible for most readers. Depending on the subject, I tend to like rather dry and scholarly reads but not always. This was none of these things and I actually found myself fully engrossed with this book. I also actually found this to be an extremely impressive piece of work. If not just for the attempt at explaining and understanding such a volatile subject as racism, then easily for the amount of effort and research put into it.
The author, Fredrick B. Pike, uses all available media ranging from books, newspapers, music to film to reconstruct the attitudes and opinions held by White Europeans and Latin Americans towards one another over the centuries. Unfortunately, most of these opinions found here in this book are largely from the European point of view but it does not fail to offer some of those from the Latin perspective as well. My only wish for this book is that it were somehow more balanced in this and offered more from the latter but possibly these are harder to come by when it comes to sources? Nevertheless, I still found a great many revelations in his exploration of this subject regardless.
The main point that the book strives to make is that the contentious division between these two cultures essentially stemmed from a philosophical viewpoint. Fundamentally, European society and all of their various settlers to North America largely viewed nature as something to be tamed and dominated. To their perception, those of Latin cultures, American Indians, African slaves, as well as all women and children, including their own, were basically all helpless victims of nature’s whims. This belief was based largely upon the apparent inability of these others to overcome their surroundings like they themselves purportedly did.
Of course, any lay student of American history has at least peripherally heard this line of reasoning before, from the very first stories of the early European settlers of North American who perceived the vast Indian lands that lay before them as being entirely unused because of its lack of apparent development to their minds, to thebelief in American exceptionalism readily found in the doctrine of Manifest Destiny. However, for me, the extent by which the genealogy of this system of belief is traced and outlined has not been as thoroughly explored as it is found here. Its steady progression and shifts, as well as some occasional reversals, over the years are exhaustively pursued within these pages.
Only, make no mistake, this is not an apologist attempt at absolving the behavior by neither justifying nor excusing the actions caused by this worldview in any way but rather is trying to understand and rationalize this viewpoint. In the end, all of the barbarity and viciousness of this “philosophical” stance is laid bare for what it is, racism. He literally excoriates all of these attitudes and the damage they’ve done and continue to do in the final chapters.
Clearly, this book is not for everyone as it is on the whole a rather uncomfortable read on many levels, to say the least. Only, no amount of squeamishness of this subject is an adequate excuse to avoid the subject entirely. Pike fiercely does so himself and rather authoritatively at that. Personally, based on just this one book I would not hesitate in the slightest to pick up another of his titles.
The author, Fredrick B. Pike, uses all available media ranging from books, newspapers, music to film to reconstruct the attitudes and opinions held by White Europeans and Latin Americans towards one another over the centuries. Unfortunately, most of these opinions found here in this book are largely from the European point of view but it does not fail to offer some of those from the Latin perspective as well. My only wish for this book is that it were somehow more balanced in this and offered more from the latter but possibly these are harder to come by when it comes to sources? Nevertheless, I still found a great many revelations in his exploration of this subject regardless.
The main point that the book strives to make is that the contentious division between these two cultures essentially stemmed from a philosophical viewpoint. Fundamentally, European society and all of their various settlers to North America largely viewed nature as something to be tamed and dominated. To their perception, those of Latin cultures, American Indians, African slaves, as well as all women and children, including their own, were basically all helpless victims of nature’s whims. This belief was based largely upon the apparent inability of these others to overcome their surroundings like they themselves purportedly did.
Of course, any lay student of American history has at least peripherally heard this line of reasoning before, from the very first stories of the early European settlers of North American who perceived the vast Indian lands that lay before them as being entirely unused because of its lack of apparent development to their minds, to thebelief in American exceptionalism readily found in the doctrine of Manifest Destiny. However, for me, the extent by which the genealogy of this system of belief is traced and outlined has not been as thoroughly explored as it is found here. Its steady progression and shifts, as well as some occasional reversals, over the years are exhaustively pursued within these pages.
Only, make no mistake, this is not an apologist attempt at absolving the behavior by neither justifying nor excusing the actions caused by this worldview in any way but rather is trying to understand and rationalize this viewpoint. In the end, all of the barbarity and viciousness of this “philosophical” stance is laid bare for what it is, racism. He literally excoriates all of these attitudes and the damage they’ve done and continue to do in the final chapters.
Clearly, this book is not for everyone as it is on the whole a rather uncomfortable read on many levels, to say the least. Only, no amount of squeamishness of this subject is an adequate excuse to avoid the subject entirely. Pike fiercely does so himself and rather authoritatively at that. Personally, based on just this one book I would not hesitate in the slightest to pick up another of his titles.
Displaying 1 of 1 review