Our America : a Hispanic history of the United States

"A rich and moving chronicle for our very present." —Julio Ortega, __New York Times Book Review__The United States is still typically conceived of as an offshoot of England, with our history unfolding east to west beginning with the first English settlers in Jamestown. This view overlooks the significance of America's Hispanic past. With the profile of the United States increasingly Hispanic, the importance of recovering the Hispanic dimension to our national story has never been greater. This absorbing narrative begins with the explorers and conquistadores who planted Spain's first colonies in Puerto Rico, Florida, and the Southwest. Missionaries and rancheros carry Spain's expansive impulse into the late eighteenth century, settling California, mapping the American interior to the Rockies, and charting the Pacific coast. During the nineteenth century Anglo-America expands west under the banner of "Manifest Destiny" and consolidates control through war with Mexico.... Maps the influence of America's Hispanic past, from the explorers and conquistadors who helped colonize Puerto Rico and Florida, to the missionaries and rancheros who settled in California and the 20th-century resurgence in major cities like Chicago and Miami. The United States is still typically conceived of as an offshoot of England, with our history unfolding east to west beginning with the first English settlers in Jamestown. This view overlooks the significance of America's Hispanic past. With the profile of the United States increasingly Hispanic, the importance of recovering the Hispanic dimension to our national story has never been greater. This narrative begins with the explorers and conquistadores who planted Spain's first colonies in Puerto Rico, Florida, and the Southwest. Missionaries and rancheros carry Spain's expansive impulse into the late eighteenth century, settling California, mapping the American interior to the Rockies, and charting the Pacific coast. During the nineteenth century Anglo-America expands west under the banner of "Manifest Destiny" and consolidates control through war with Mexico. In the Hispanic resurgence that follows, it is the peoples of Latin America who overspread the continent, from the Hispanic heartland in the West to major cities such as Chicago, Miami, New York, and Boston. The United States clearly has a Hispanic present and future, and here the author presents its Hispanic past. -- From book jacket. “A rich and moving chronicle for our very present.” —Julio Ortega, New York Times Book Review The United States is still typically conceived of as an offshoot of England, with our history unfolding east to west beginning with the first English settlers in Jamestown. This view overlooks the significance of America’s Hispanic past. With the profile of the United States increasingly Hispanic, the importance of recovering the Hispanic dimension to our national story has never been greater. This absorbing narrative begins with the explorers and conquistadores who planted Spain’s first colonies in Puerto Rico, Florida, and the Southwest. Missionaries and rancheros carry Spain’s expansive impulse into the late eighteenth century, settling California, mapping the American interior to the Rockies, and charting the Pacific coast. During the nineteenth century Anglo-America expands west under the banner of “Manifest Destiny” and consolidates control through war with Mexico. In the Hispanic resurgence that follows, it is the peoples of Latin America who overspread the continent, from the Hispanic heartland in the West to major cities such as Chicago, Miami, New York, and Boston. The United States clearly has a Hispanic present and future. And here is its Hispanic past, presented with characteristic insight and wit by one of our greatest historians. Original Sins. The first Hispanic colonization of what is now U.S. territory, c. 1505-1846 ; The fountain of youth: the first colonies in what was to be the United States, c. 1505-1763 ; The cities of Cíbola: the colonial Midwest from the Mississippi to the Rockies, c. 1598-1798 ; The pursuit of King Arthur: the shadow of Anglo-America, c. 1607-1784 ; The realm of Queen Calafia: the foundation of California and the showdown with Anglo-America, c. 1766-1846. The Empire of Eden. The expansion of Anglo-America and the Hispanic retreat, c. 1846-1898. ; The curse of Zorro: the great expropriation, c. 1846-1887 ; The revenge of Moroni: the triumph of Anglo-America, c. 1830-1898. Paradise regained? The second Hispanic colonization, c. 1898-2012 ; The return to Aztlán: Americanization and resistance in the age of Mexican countercolonization, c. 1898-1986 ; The republic of Hesperus: the remaking of the Hispanic United States, c. 1914-2012 ; Retrospect and prospect: why the United States is, and has to be, a Latin American country. "The increasingly Hispanic profile of the United States calls for a new American history with its Hispanic dimension restored. With characteristic wit and insight, Felipe Fernández-Armesto scrapes away layers of Anglocentrism to expose a fresh, compelling Hispanic past."--Cover, page 4