Department of History

I am a teacher and historian of Mexico in the context of the Americas and the Atlantic World. I most aim to understand the histories of popular communities as they have faced colonial, national, and transnational powers. In the process, I continue to search for ways to integrate studies of the environment, production, state powers, social and gender relations, and cultural constructions.
In other words, I study Mexican communities seeking to create a more integrated history--and to explore that history over the long run and in global context.

For Georgetown undergraduates, I teach the historical foundations of Latin America civilization, 1500-1800, as well as the history of Mexico, its revolutions, and its integrations with the United States.
With graduate students, my courses focus in integrating the History of Mexico with global developments--from the colonial period through the present.
My primary comparative interests focus on Central America and the Caribbean, Brazil, and increasingly the United States--all viewed in Atlantic context.

When I am not teaching, my colleagues decided that I should spend much of my time during my three-year term as History Department Chair (2003-2006) hiring and keeping smart and energetic colleagues, helping them gain grants to promote their scholarship, finding opportunities for creative curriculum development, and otherwise helping a community of 40 teaching scholars, dozens of doctoral students, and thousands of undergraduates flourish. It is exhausting work with constant rewards.

And when I leave the department (which my wife and two adult daughters emphasizes is not often enough) my goal is to get to the Bay, the ocean, or the mountains--to exhale and remember that nature still rules, if only we will allow her.

Finally, I am a long suffering citizen of the Red Sox nation (yet open enough to accept a committed Yankees fan as a doctoral student). Recent triumphs have thrown the world into disarray. We of the Nation have lived our lives knowing that the best of people would fight the good fight--and despite valiant efforts, always fall just short of victory. We have no idea how to live in the glow of victory.
Should I stop my quest to understand insurgent communities, who rise to demand justice, gain dignity, perhaps even force some change for the better--but inevitably remain subordinate communities when the struggle subsides? Should I now become a student of Those Who Rule?
I am consoled in my confusion by the historian's guiding vision: smart scholars predict the past, never the future. At least when I study the 1700s in order to predict--that is to understand--the 1800s, I have a chance to get it right.