José Vasconcelos: The Prophet of Race

142 Pages·2011·0.392 MB·English

by  Ilan Stavans

José Vasconcelos
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José Vasconcelos
The Prophet of Race
Ilan Stavans
Rutgers University Press
New Brunswick, New Jersey, and London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Stavans, Ilan.
José Vasconcelos : the prophet of race / Ilan Stavans.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Includes an English translation of Vasconcelos’s “Mestizaje” from his
The cosmic race and his lecture “The race problem in Latin America,” one
of three Harris Foundation lectures originally delivered at the University
of Chicago in 1926.
ISBN 978–0–8135–5063–3 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–8135–
5064–0 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Vasconcelos, José, 1881–1959—Criticism and interpretation.
2. Vasconcelos, José, 1881–1959—Philosophy. 3. Vasconcelos, José,
1881–1959. Raza cósmica. 4. Mestizos. 5. Mestizaje. 6. Cosmology.
7. Latin America—Race relations. I. Vasconcelos, José, 1881–1959.
Raza cósmica. Mestizaje. English. II. Vasconcelos, José, 1881–1959. Race
problem in Latin America. III. Title.
F1234.V3S73 2011
305.80098—dc22
2010040717
A British Cataloging-in-Publication record
for this book is available from the British Library.
This volume copyright © 2011 by Rutgers, The State University
Preface, essay “The Prophet of Race,” and scholarly apparatus copyright
© 2011 by Ilan Stavans
Translation of “Mestizaje” copyright © 2011 by John H. R. Polt
“The Race Problem in Latin America” reprinted, with minor alterations,
from José Vasconcelos and Manuel Gamio, Aspects of Mexican
Civilization (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1926), by permission
of the University of Chicago Press.
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by
any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please
contact Rutgers University Press, 100 Joyce Kilmer Avenue, Piscataway,
NJ 08854–8099. The only exception to this prohibition is “fair use” as
defi ned by U.S. copyright law.
Visit our Web site: http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu
Manufactured in the United States of America
. . . the mestizo will produce a civilization more universal
in its tendency than any other race in the past.
—José Vasconcelos

Contents
Preface xi
Ilan Stavans
The Prophet of Race 1
José Vasconcelos
Mestizaje 45
The Race Problem in Latin America 91
Chronology 113
Acknowledgments 123
ix