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This article explores the activism of Arab Mexicans during the transition from the sultanate of Abdülhamid II, known as the Hamidian regime, and the beginning of the rule of the Committee of Union and Progress, known as the Young Turks government. The paper discusses the activism of intellectuals, social network leaders, and associations that created affinity ties with the Ottoman government and French authorities. These activities aspired to consolidate the diplomatic protection of Ottomans in Mexico. The compilation of primary sources shows the spread of Ottomanism and Francophilia within the first generation of Arab Mexicans. These discourses of affinity are relevant elements to understanding the activism in the Great War and at the dawn of the Mandate system in the Mashriq.

This paper studies the texts and illustrations published in the Spanish magazine Semanario Pintoresco Español (1836-1857) about the conquest of America, especially Mexico, and those dedicated to pre-Hispanic archeology as cultural transfers. Their sources are identified, and the adaptation processes are analyzed to show how they are inserted into the repertoire of the Spanish cultural system. These collaborations contributed both to the creation of a story about the conquest of Mexico and to the defense of the role of Spain regarding the discovery of pre-Hispanic civilizations.

El Álbum mexicano was one of the publishing enterprises led by the famous printer Ignacio Cumplido. The young Mexican republic needed to build up a story of itself and its citizens, and El Album was a privileged space in the illustrated press. Biographies of characters, descriptions of monuments and landscapes, customs texts and so on would seek to create a collection of images that would allow readers of the publication to participate in a national unity. This paper analyses the importance of travel literature published in the newspaper in this process, as well as the culture mediation and transfer strategies that it articulated.

Ethnic Identity and Ethnic Political Activity Don’t Necessarily Go Hand in Hand. Identitary Expressions Among the Teenek and Nahua of the Veracruzan Huasteca.In the Huasteca region, in Mexico’s northeast, two Indians groups, the Nahua and the Teenek, experience the interaction with cultural otherness and with modern, national society in very different ways. This paper compares the Teenek position toward the Other to the one of their nearby Nahua neighbors. While the Teenek position is more reserved and hermetic, the Nahua position toward the Other is characterized by more active and assertive participation outside their communities. The cultural strategies of both groups appear to be radically opposed. Nonetheless, none of these two groups is involved in Indian political militancy and their ethnic identity is expressed in more discrete ways. The comparison between the two groups help us understand the character of the differentiated interactions of two neighboring ethnic groups with the modern world and national society that may be rooted in each group’s particular worldview and history. From a theoretical standpoint, this paper addresses the problem of the cultural and social construction of collective identities and Otherness in modern and multicultural societies, proposing to reconstruct the concept of ethnicity from a cognitive perspective rather than as identity politics.

This paper analizes the public spectacles in Zacatecas, Mexico, from the end of the eighteen century through the middle of the nineteenth century. It shows how the public spectacles fullfil the goal of entertaining population, but also how autorities utilize them to disciplining society in the transit to a new historical order.

The main purpose of this paper is to develop a comparative study of the trips that the illusionist Onofroff made to the capital cities of Argentina and Mexico, in 1895 and 1900 respectively. During his successful trips through America, the illusionist stayed a long period of time in those two cities, and his presence caused different reactions from many participants of the cultural life. Physicians, spiritualists, writers and politicians coming from both contexts, felt attracted by the artist's shows of telepathy and hypnotism. In this article we try to show that the study of Onofroff's performances goes beyond the scope of the fin-de-siècle history of theater. By contrast, the analysis of his disturbing presence can work as a prism that perfectly reflects many areas of the cultural, scientific and ideological life of those cities. Through the description of several angles of the scientific cultures of the two cities, an explanation of the different responses aroused by Onofroff's shows will be outlined.

The paper presents from a historical and ethnographical perspective the process of social change in Nueva Jerusalén, Michoacán, an apocalyptic community in southwestern Mexico which was entirely founded based on a prophetical apparition of Virgin Mary (María del Rosario), fully made up of converse immigrants. The author observes two political aspects in the emergence and development of the community: its antagonistic relationship towards modernity in the Catholic Church and the world, on one hand, and on the other, the configuration of its leaderships and the expressions of conflict inwards of the cult.

The paper compares two relevant cases of social and political mobilization around the figures of two female prophets from the 19th century: Teresa Urrea in the north of Mexico and Mélanie Calvat in France during 1840`s. From the social and political leadership that some female prophets achieved inside their communities, the author argues that the tension between clergy and female prophets was about ideologies and spaces, using the prophecies as strategies to increase their influence as political figures inside their communities and mobilized them under critical circumstances.

The capture of the bunker (July, 1979) marked the end of Anastasio Somoza’s dictatorship and the victory of the Sandinista Revolution. A set of images of this fact, recorded by Pedro Valtierra, was published by the Mexican newspaper unomásuno. This paper analyzes how thess photographic images were diffused, comparing oral testimonies, newspaper and photography archives.

The research on elements and ways in which Mexico and its regions participated in the exhibitions is a valuable inventory of natural and human resources as well as of social, scientific and technical progress; so far, historical studies on the subject focused on the actions of elites located in the central government of the country and neglected the regional specificities in the periphery of the central power. In this paper, we are interested in presenting contribution of the State of Puebla to the Mexican pavilions at the international exhibitions and the participation of local actors in this collective enterprise. Our sources come from the Branch for the Promotion of the National Archives and public archives from the State of Puebla.