Tina Rosenberg spent five years trying to understand their world and learning to live with these "children of Cain." Their stories are disturbing precisely because these people are not monsters; the...

After invading highland Guatemala in 1524, Spaniards claimed to have smashed the Kaqchikel and K'iche' Maya kingdoms and to have forged a new colony--with their leader, Pedro de Alvarado, as Guatemala's conquistador. This volume shows that the real story of the Spanish invasion was very different. Designed to be an accessible introduction to the topic as well as a significant contribution to conquest scholarship, the volume presents for the first time English translations of firsthand accounts by Spaniards, Nahuas, and Mayas.

Alvarado's letters to Cortes, published here in English...

The New York War Crimes Tribunal on Central America and the Caribbean was convened in October, 1984 to hear testimony from victims and eyewitnesses of human rights abuses, war crimes and other violations of international and domestic law in Central America and the Caribbean. This volume presents the edited statements of approximately 26 witnesses, including North American academics, church people, journalists, medical workers, Latin American students, human rights workers, refugees, labor leaders, and peasant organizers. Witnesses include Rigoberta Menchu, exiled Guatemalan Indian leader;...

A clear and balanced presentation of the dilemmas associated with each of the four nations. A skillful cultural framework is provided in the first chapter, which serves as an overview. "Foreign Affairs"

A fine study. Anderson's reputation as a scholar and a Latin Americanist will be enhanced when this study has time to make its imprint. "American Political Science Review"

This new volume provides an up-to-date survey of the Central American states involved in the current conflict. While several studies of the individual countries in the region have appeared, there have been no recent...

Former political officer for the Nicaraguan Resistance (the contras), Rogelio Pardo-Maurer shares his experiences of the factional dynamics of that group in this provocative new study. Providing an historical account of internal politics in the Resistance, Pardo-Maurer analyzes the principle factions or issues of contention, devoting special attention to the influence of the U.S. political process on Resistance policy.

The book provides an intriguing inside look at one of the most controversial resistance movements of the 20th century. Pardo-Maurer follows the internal dynamics of the...

Former political officer for the Nicaraguan Resistance (the contras), Rogelio Pardo-Maurer shares his experiences of the factional dynamics of that group in this provocative new study. Providing an historical account of internal politics in the Resistance, Pardo-Maurer analyzes the principle factions or issues of contention, devoting special attention to the influence of the U.S. political process on Resistance policy.

The book provides an intriguing inside look at one of the most controversial resistance movements of the 20th century. Pardo-Maurer follows the internal dynamics of the...

How did the ancient Maya rule their world? Despite more than a century of archaeological investigation and glyphic decipherment, the nature of Maya political organization and political geography has remained an open question. Many debates have raged over models of centralization versus decentralization, superordinate and subordinate status--with far-flung analogies to emerging states in Europe, Asia, and Africa. But Prudence Rice asserts that neither the model of two giant "superpowers" nor that which postulates scores of small, weakly independent polities fits the accumulating body of...

Guatemala draws some half million tourists each year, whose brief visits to the ruins of ancient Maya cities and contemporary highland Maya villages may give them only a partial and folkloric understanding of Guatemalan society. In this vividly written travel narrative, Stephen Connely Benz explores the Guatemala that casual travelers miss, using his encounters with ordinary Guatemalans at the mall, on the streets, at soccer games, and even at the funeral of massacre victims to illuminate the social reality of Guatemala today.

The book opens with an extended section on the capital,...

Maya Cultural Activism in Guatemala marks a new era in Guatemalan studies by offering an up-to-the-minute look at the pan-Maya movement and the future of the Maya people as they struggle to regain control over their cultural destiny. The successful emergence of what is in some senses a nationalism grounded in ethnicity and language has challenged scholars to reconsider their concepts of nationalism, community, and identity.

Editors Edward F. Fischer and R. McKenna Brown have brought together essays by virtually all the leading U.S. experts on contemporary Maya...

Winner, George Perkins Marsh Award for Best Book in Environmental History, American Society for Environmental History, 2007

Bananas, the most frequently consumed fresh fruit in the United States, have been linked to Miss Chiquita and Carmen Miranda, "banana republics," and Banana Republic clothing stores--everything from exotic kitsch, to Third World dictatorships, to middle-class fashion. But how did the rise in banana consumption in the United States affect the banana-growing regions of Central America? In this lively, interdisciplinary study, John Soluri integrates...

The last three decades of the twentieth century brought relentless waves of death squads, political kidnappings, and other traumas to the people of Guatemala. Many people fled the country to escape the violence. Yet, at the same moment, a popular movement for justice brought together unlikely bands of behind-the-scenes heroes, blurring ethnic, geographic, and even class lines.

The Quiet Revolutionaries is drawn from interviews conducted by Frank Afflitto in the early 1990s with more than eighty survivors of the state-sanctioned violence. Gathered under frequently...

The seventeenth century has been characterized as "Latin America's forgotten century." This landmark work, originally published in 1973, attempted to fill the vacuum in knowledge by providing an account of the first great colonial cycle in Spanish Central America. The colonial Spanish society of the sixteenth century was very different from that described in the eighteenth century. What happened in the Latin American colonies between the first conquests, the seizure of long-accumulated Indian wealth, the first silver booms, and the period of modern raw material supply? How did Latin...

Born of Italian-American parents, Helen Barolini rediscovered her culinary heritage when she married Italian writer Antonio Barolini and lived for some years in Italy. Festa is a year-long feast of memories and delicious, traditional Italian dishes from St. Nicholas sweetmeats in December and perciatelli with sardines and fennel for March s St. Joseph s Day, to figs with prosciutto for summer s Ferragosto and pumpkin gnocchi for an American Thanksgiving in Italy."

This survey of Central American history, includes the five republics of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Costa Rica. There is a summary of events in 1960-62, with special reference to Central American economic collaboration, the role of the United States, and the reluctance of the local moneyed class to give up its privileged position.

The author discusses the social, economic, and political problems of British Honduras as they are affected by the variety of racial, religious, and linguistic components in its small population. These problems are looked at in their historical context as well.

At a juncture in history when much interest and attention is focused on Central and South American political, ecological, social, and environmental concerns, this dictionary fills a major gap in reference materials relating to Amerindian tribes. This one-volume reference collects important information about the current status of the indigenous peoples of Central and South America and offers a chronology of the conquest of the Amerindian tribes; a list of tribes by country; and an extensive bibliography of surviving American Indian groups. Historical as well as contemporary descriptions of...