Thread by @HistoryBrian

The #ElPasoSyllabus:

It’s been 2 weeks since the horrendous shooting in El Paso, the murder of 22 innocent individuals & wounding of 24 others. 2 weeks, #ElPasoShooting is no longer trending, most news outlets have dropped the story, the process of forgetting has begun.

There are several things that may explain why we’ve begun to forget El Paso. Many people don’t know the city and it may seems geographically far removed from the worldview of folks unfamiliar with the Southwest.

The victims of the shooting, mainly Mexican/Mexican American people, may seem unfamiliar to some Americans, beyond the rhetoric/stereotyping of the immigration reform debate. Many people probably don’t see Mexican-origin people as the “normal” victims of racist violence.

The white supremacy of the murderer might seem outside the norm of racially motivated killings to many Americans given that he focused on Mexican Americans. Understanding white supremacy and anti-Mexican racism and violence may be difficult for some folks.

Racism and violence directed at African Americans may be more understandable for some given the long history of slavery and Jim Crow segregation in the US, but understanding and accepting that such racism has/is directed at persons of Mexican ancestry is important.

If we are to understand what happened in El Paso then we cannot let the furor over the murders die down, we cannot allow El Paso to be forgotten. With that in mind, I offer the #ElPasoSyllabus as a teaching tool & resource repository for us to understand what happened in El Paso.

While I am beginning the #ElPasoSyllabus with this thread of book recommendations, I take no ownership of this project. My hope is that like the #FergusonSyllabus and #CharlestonSyllabus, we can begin to crowdsource journal articles, books, op-eds, news articles, interviews,

dissertations/theses, and other data as resources to understand what happened in El Paso from a historical and contemporary viewpoint. What follows in this thread are important books relevant to the study of anti-Mexican racism, white supremacy, violence, and similar subjects.

My organization is admittedly rudimentary. This list is by no means complete or exhaustive, omissions on my part are unintentional. Please add to these humble beginnings, craft other topical focuses, share, retweet, @ your colleagues and friends on Twitter, and spread the word.

1.Anti-Mexican violence:

There is no better recent source for understanding how anti-Mexican racism leads to violence and death than @MonicaMnzMtz The Injustice Never Leaves You. Focuses primarily on turn of the century lynchings and massacres in the Texas Borderlands.

Like @MonicaMnzMtz, @BenjaminHJohns1 outstanding book Revolution in Texas examines similar subjects as The Injustice Never Leaves You but finds that in the aftermath of state sanctioned violence in Texas Mexican Americans concentrated on American citizenship as forms of activism.

@ElProfeML in Militarizing the Border explores similar subjects but extends his analysis into the broader Southwest, particularly into New Mexico and Arizona, showing that the anti-Mexican violence and racism in Texas was a broader southwestern problem.

Paul Cool’s Salt Warriors focuses on economic competition and the greed of white American immigrants to the El Paso region spawned anti-Mexican racism/violence.

David Correia’s excellent work, esp Properties of Violence, explores anti-Mexican racism and resistance in New Mexico.

Nicole M. Guidotti-Hernández’s Unspeakable Violence scrutinizes examples of anti-Mexican (as well as other ethnic groups) violence across the Southwest.

See also, David Gutiérrez, Walls and Mirrors; Mark A. Weitz, The Sleepy Lagoon Murder Case.

2.Anti-Mexican racism:

Arnoldo De León’s They Called Them Greasers is a now classic text and foundational text on the racist viewpoints that white Texans had about Mexican people. See also his Mexican Americans in Texas.

Tomás Almaguer, Racial Fault Lines, explores similar subjects in California.

Laura E. Gómez’s Manifest Destinies examines anti-Mexican racism, violence, and state building in New Mexico.

In Decade of Betrayal Francisco Balderama and Raymond Rodriguez explore how anti-Mexican sentiments propelled the federal governments massive repatriation campaigns of the 1930, a history that is eerily similar to what is happening today.

Juan García’s Operation Wetback explores a similar repatriation effort that began in 1954.

Anglos and Mexicans in the Making of Texas, the now classic book by David Montejano looks at anti-Mexican racism, but also so much more. See also Montejano’s excellent study of Chicano activism Quixote’s Soldiers.

Mario Barrera’s Race and Class in the Southwest examines anti-Mexican racism but with region specific, southwestern focus.

Natalia Molina’s work intersects with books on anti-Mexican racism & legal history. See How Race Is Made in America and Relational Formations of Race.

See also, Martha Menchaca, Recovering History, Constructing Race; Leo R. Chavez, The Latino Threat; Samuel Truett, Fugitive Landscapes.

3. El Paso and other southwestern urban centers:

One of the best recent works on El Paso and it’s Mexican American population is @mperaleshtx Smeltertown. If you want to understand El Paso from a Mexican American perspective read Smeltertown.

Mario García’s Desert Immigrants remains an indispensable source for understanding El Paso, it’s mexicano population, and the Southwest more broadly.

Anthony Quiroz’s book on Victoria, TX, Claiming Citizenship is an easily accessible text on Mexican American life in S. Texas.

For a work similar to Quiroz’s but on San Antonio, see Rodolfo Rosales, The Illusion of Inclusion.

The works on Mexican American Los Angeles are almost too numerous to list here, but for one of the best starting places see George J. Sánchez, Becoming Mexican American.

Also on LA and another crucial work is that of William Deverell and his fine book Whitewashed Adobe.

For an outstanding that book that explores the early history of Mexican Americans in Texas and New Mexico, see, Andrés Reséndez, Changing National Identities at the Frontier.

See also: Mario García, The Making of a Mexican American Mayor; Patricia Worthington, El Paso and the Mexican Revolution; Benjamin Marquez, Power and Politics in a Chicano Barrio; John Mack Faragher, Eternity Street; Richard Griswold del Castillo, The Los Angeles Barrio.

4.Mexican Americans and legal history:

Ian F. Haney López’s White By Law and Ariela Gross’s What Blood Won’t Tell both explores aspects of Mexican American racial constructions in the court system.

Michael Olivas’s work on Mexican American’s and the legal system has been really important, esp his edited volume Colored Men and Hombres Aquí.

Guadalupe San Miguel’s work on education in Texas remains very important, but the book that offered really critical analysis and good legal history is his Brown, Not White.

Carlos Soltero explores Mexican American legal history more broadly with his examination of the Supreme Court titled Latinos and American Law.

Julian Lim’s excellent work in Porous Borders takes us on a tour of not only legal history but the broad contours of border life.

Steven Wilson’s work on legal history, esp The Rise of Judicial Management, has also been really foundational.

@klytlehernandez has also done foundational work on legal history and the border region, esp Migra! and City of Inmates.

See also, Rachel St. John’s Line in the Sand; Deborah Kang’s, The INS on the Line; Omar S. Valerio-Jiménez, River of Dreams.

5. Lynching:

Works on the lynching of Mexican people are crucial to understanding the violence in El Paso. In fact, the #ElPasoShooting is in some ways akin to a lynching of many committed by one, as opposed to the usual lynching scenario of a group killing an individual.

For the lynching of Mexican people the single best work published thus far is Bill Carrigan and @Clive__Webb Forgotten Dead, a fantastic and painful account of lynching in the Southwest.

Carrigan also published The Making of a Lynching Culture on lynching in Central Texas.

Nicholas Villanueva, The Lynching of Mexicans in the Texas Borderlands, explores several of the most abhorrent lychings of Mexican people in Texas.

See also, Ken Gonzales-Day, Lynching in the West.

6. Mexican Americans and Policing:

Police violence directed at Mexican people is an important subject. Because their work looks not just at anti-Mexican violence but also violence from police agents like the Texas Rangers, again see the work of @MonicaMnzMtz & @BenjaminHJohns1.

Two of the formative texts on policing are Armando Morales’s Ando Sangrando, a now classic work on Mexican American and police conflict.

And Edward Escobar, Race, Police, and the Making of a Political Identity explores the history of Mexican American interactions with the LAPD.

Dwight Watson in Race and the Houston Police Department examines HPD and pays close attention to several instances of police violence against Mexican Houstonians, esp the police murder of Jose Campos Torres.

7. Mexican American agency and activism:

There are many sources on Mexican American civil rights activism. I am limiting this section mainly to books that examine explore how Mexican Americans challenged racist violence in the Southwest.

One of the earliest forms of Mexican resistance to Anglo violence/racism was social banditry. Works on bandits have proliferated in recent years, see, Lori Wilson, The Joaquín Band; John Boessenecker, Bandido; Jerry Thompson, Cortina; W. C. Jameson, Border Bandits, Border Raids.

For an excellent example of Chicano activism in San Diego and how the local Mexican American community challenged police and INS violence check out @ProfeJimmyP Raza Sí, Migra No!

My own work, especially Fighting Their Own Battles, has examined Mexican American civil rights activism with a particular focus on how Mexican-origin people challenged racist law enforcement (also the subject of my current book project).

Lorena Oropeza’s work is indispensable for an understanding of activism in the Southwest, esp her Raza Sí! Guerra No! and forthcoming book The King of Adobe.

The work of Maggie Rivas-Rodrigues has been hugely important to our understanding Mexican American military service as both a tool of patriotism as well as a civil rights tactic. See her most recent book Texas Mexican Americans and Postwar Civil Rights as a good example.

Ernesto B. Vigil’s The Crusade for Justice explores the Colorado based Crusade for Justice, which made resisting police abuse a major part of its activism.

See also, Patrick J. Carroll, Felix Longoria’s Wake; Craig Kaplowitz, LULAC, Mexican Americans, and National Policy; Arturo Rosales, Chicano!; Richard Martinez, PADRES; Emilio Zamora, Claiming Rights and Righting Wrongs in Texas; Lori Flores, Grounds for Dreaming; (cont.)

Lara Medina, Las Hermanas; Robert Rosenbaum, Mexicano Resistance in the Southwest; Ignacio García, Chicanismo!; Juan Gómez-Quiñones, Chicano Politics; Carlos Muñoz, Youth, Identity, Power; Zaragosa Vargas, Labor Rights Are Civil Rights; Gabriela González, Redeeming La Raza.

I'd add here @mcjuancito Fevered Measures, which examines medical efforts at the border and the way health authorities and authorities more broadly used the threat of disease in an attempt to police the border.