Americas: The Changing Face of Latin America and the Caribbean

Abstract

Stunning for its magisterial sweep Americas is the most authoritative history to date of contemporary Latin America and the Caribbean. From Mexico to Tierra del Fuego, from Cuba to Trinidad and Tobago, Americas weaves a captivating narrative that analyzes the historical, demographic, political, social, cultural, religious, and economic trends in the region. With incisiveness and clarity, Peter Winn offers commanding analyses of, among other subjects: the first half of the century, when Latin America and the Caribbean assumed a new place in the world order, only to have prosperity shattered by the Great Depression and World War II; the Cold War era, when the region's economic and political systems were in disarray; the vast migration of peoples throughout the continent; the shaping of racial and ethnic identities through rural transformation and urban opportunities; the role of women as they challenge stereotypes about gender and the family; she influence of the Catholic Church and of evangelical and spiritualist sects; the extraordinary cultural ferment in the area; the three political upheavals that have shaped contemporary Latin American history - Mexico in the 1910s, Cuba in 1959, and Nicaragua in 1979; and the powerful drive for democracy and economic independence that resonates throughout the hemisphere today. Americas gives an indispensable overview of the similarities and differences among the thirty-three countries and half-billion people who inhabit a region that has played a crucial role in shaping the history of the modern world.

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