Reforming Chile: Cultural Politics, Nationalism, and the Rise of the Middle Class (ENG)

The University of North Carolina Press, 2001 - 312 p. ISBN10: 0807826049 ISBN13: 9780807826041 Highlighting the crucial yet largely overlooked role played by society's middle layers in the historical development of Latin America, Patrick Barr-Melej provides the first comprehensive analysis of the rise of Chile's middle-class reform movement and its profound impact on that country's cultural and political landscapes. He shows how a diverse collection of middle-class intellectuals, writers, politicians, educators, and bureaucrats forged a "progressive" nationalism and advanced an ambitious cultural-political project between the 1890s and 1940s. Together, reformers challenged the power of elite groups and sought to quell working-class revolutionary activism as they endeavored to democratize culture and fortify liberal democracy. Using sources that range from archival documents and newspapers to short stories, novels, and school textbooks, Barr-Melej examines the reform movement's cultural ideas and their political applications, especially as they were articulated in the areas of literature and public education. In the process, he provides a new framework for understanding Chile's cultural and political evolution, as well as the complicated place of the middle class in a society experiencing the swift changes inherent in capitalist modernization.

Highlighting the crucial yet largely overlooked role played by society's middle layers in the historical development of Latin America, Patrick Barr-Melej provides the first comprehensive analysis of the rise of Chile's middle-class reform movement and its profound impact on that country's cultural and political landscapes. He shows how a diverse collection of middle-class intellectuals, writers, politicians, educators, and bureaucrats forged a progressive nationalism and advanced an ambitious cultural-political project between the 1890s and 1940s. Together, reformers challenged the power of elite groups and sought to quell working-class revolutionary activism as they endeavored to democratize culture and fortify liberal democracy.

Using sources that range from archival documents and newspapers to short stories, novels, and school textbooks, Barr-Melej examines the reform movement's cultural ideas and their political applications, especially as they were articulated in the areas of literature and public education. In the process, he provides a new framework for understanding Chile's cultural and political evolution, as well as the complicated place of the middle class in a society experiencing the swift changes inherent in capitalist modernization.

Times Literary Supplement

[Barr-Melej's] analysis is often compelling, particularly when he discusses the effect of the reformist movement on state education policy.

A Troubled Belle Epoque -- Nationalists -- Rewriting Chile Criollismo And The Generation Of 1900 -- Prose, Politics, And Patria From Alessandri To The Popular Front -- For Culture And Country Middle-class Reformers In Public Education -- Teaching The Nation -- The Three Rs Readers, Representations, And Reformism. Patrick Barr-melej. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Highlighting the crucial yet largely overlooked role played by society's middle layers in the historical development of Latin America, this work provides an analysis of the rise of Chile's middle-class reform movement and its profound impact on that country's cultural and political landscapes