Death and the idea of Mexico
By: by Claudio Lomnitz.
Publisher: Zone Books; Distributed by MIT Press
Published: 2005
Place of publication: Brooklyn, N.Y; Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 581
Subjects: Death -- Social aspects -- Mexico; Death in popular culture -- Mexico; Death in art; Death in literature; Mexico -- History; Mexico -- Politics and government; Mexico -- Social life and customs
Description: "Death and the Idea of Mexico is the first social, cultural, and political history of death in a nation that has made death its tutelary sign. Examining the history of death and of the death sign from sixteenth-century holocaust to contemporary Mexican-American identity politics, anthropologist Claudio Lomnitz's innovative study marks a turning point in understanding Mexico's rich and unique use of death imagery. Unlike contemporary Europeans and Americans, whose denial of death permeates their cultures, the Mexican people display and cultivate a jovial familiarity with death. This intimacy with death has become the cornerstone of Mexico's national identity." "Based on a stunning range of sources - from missionary testimonies to newspaper cartoons, from masterpieces of artistic vanguards to accounts of public executions and political assassinations - Death and the Idea of Mexico moves beyond the limited methodology of traditional historiographies of death to probe the depths of a people and a country whose fearless acquaintance with death shapes the very terms of its social compact."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.