History Titles

The Cubans: Our Legacy in the United States. A collective biography. ISBN: 978-1-888205-41-1. $23.95

The Cubans: Our Legacy in the United States chronicles the Cuban immigration to the United States from the 1800s to the present era. The author analyzes the impact the Cuban community has had on the cultural, economic, social, sports, and political scene in American society throughout multiple generations. Cuban immigrants have been one of the most successful communities in the United States. The book examines the contribution to baseball from Martín Dihigo to Tony Pérez and from Ernesto Lecuona to Gloria Estefan in music. In business circles the reader will discover that The Coca Cola Company, the Kellogg Company and McDonalds Corporation had Cuban-born Chief Executive Officers and that Movado watch company was owned by a refugee who fled communist Cuba. The book vividly depicts more than 250 extraordinary and intriguing men and women that make for engrossing and captivating reading. This informative and insightful work is highly recommended for Cuban-Americans, all Latinos and for those who enjoy reading about successful and trailblazing new Americans. Fernando "Fernán" Hernández is married and makes his home in Miami where he is a professor. He has written two Spanish-language books, Potaje (www.alexlib.com/potaje) and Lo que aprendí de mi perro (www.alexlib.com/miperro). His work also appears in the anthology Un Horizonte Literario: Poesías, Cuentos y Algo Más. It is puzzling how the memories of a nine year old child were kept intact to share with us more than forty years later some of his memories...virtually his feelings are so real you can touch the untouchable joy, pain, his love for his people, for his country of so long ago. Honoring his roots, the author goes on a journey traveling from years past to the present time. While reading the pages I found dedication, precise statistics, as well as stories that come alive of a great number of people that forced by destiny had to redirect their lives. These are the Cuban immigrants, some exiled by force, others born of these exiled people. Julie Pujol-Karel, Poet, Texas.

La revelación del Tercer Secreto de Fátima. By Jorge Cancino. ISBN: 978-1-888205-39-8. $24.95

This book focuses on how a dictator or a culturally dominant power can use language to impose cultural values. As an instrument of power, language is used by a dictator to educate, induce, or manipulate a nation's citizens into acting in accordance with the ruling power's cultural values and beliefs. Jorge Zalamea's El Gran Burundún-Burundá ha muerto, Gabriel García Márquez's El otoño del patriarca, and Mario Vargas Llosa's La fiesta del Chivo draw attention to how the use of the vernacular can resist cultural imposition by employing specific words in order to represent its own culture and nature of reality. The original significance of these words is then altered in the translated text creating a new meaning determined by the dictator's or translator's ideology and usage. The new words that have substituted the original ones reveal how the construction of language defines relationships of power and resistance between a dictator and his nation, or between one culture and another, such as the relations of the United States over Latin America. The analysis of this relationship will provide an understanding of how language functions as an instrument for the imposition of power to gain or maintain cultural or political supremacy. Peter A. Neissa was born in Bogota, Colombia, and received a Ph.D. in Hispanic Studies from Boston College and a Masters from Harvard University. At Boston College, he earned the Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award. He also taught Spanish Language and Latin American Literature at Harvard University where he earned the Distinguished Teaching Award from the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning for eight consecutive semesters. Dr. Neissa has published articles and book reviews as well as two historical novels: The Druglord and Under False Colors, which trace the history of Colombian drug trafficking. Dr. Neissa is currently the Chair of the Spanish Department at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. Cervantes observed that reading a text in translation is like looking at the back of a tapestry. Neissa wrestles with some of the issues implied in this statement in his scrutiny of the distortions, imperfections, and misrepresentations to which the transference of texts from Spanish to English inevitably lead in the case of three novels of dictatorship by Zalamea, Garcia Marquez, and Vargas Llosa. This is due not only to the paradox and power of the written word within specific cultural contexts, but also to the difficulties, dangers, and at times even abuses, that come from "passing off" a text from one language to another. The end result is that accuracy, authenticity, and truth are often sacrificed for the sake of ideological priorities, political correctness, and hegemonic control. Ironically, these are the same consequences of dictatorial tactics exercised at the expense of individuality and freedom that are portrayed in the very texts selected for this compelling comparative study that will appeal to scholars and lay readers alike. Harry L. Rosser, Latin American Literature & Area Studies, Associate Professor, Latin American Literature, Director, Latin American Studies, Boston College.

It presents an illustrated narrative probing the historical, political and international factors that led to the Battle of Puebla of 1862 from pre-Independence to the War of In dependence, international conflicts, War of Reform and the subsequent political and economic crisis of Mexico. It covers the political crisis in Mexico and the United States, itself in the midst of a civil war, and the somber prospects of foreign invasion in Mexico by three major world powers, Spain, Britain and France. It examines the question of the foreign debt, the allied invasion in Mexico in 1861, the subsequent departure of the Spanish and British forces and the extent of the French Intervention. It provides a most detailed account of the forces and activities of the French and Mexican sides, during the last three days before, the day of and the day after the battle itself. Examines also the inspiring history of a triumphant Chicano general, Ignacio Zaragoza, (1829-1862), born in a period of international conflicts and forced to flee from his home as a youth because of the American settler's revolt in Texas in 1836. It includes nine patriotic poems (Spanish-English parallel text) written in California between 1864 and 1865 commemorating CINCO DE MAYO and published for the first time in monographic form. Unquestionably, this is the definitive history book on The Battle of Puebla on the Cinco de Mayo, 1862.

 “This is an amazingly interesting work of historical narrative on Cinco de Mayo dating from 1861, California 1864-1865, and its geopolitical ramifications; ably introduced with a compilation of illustrations from the period…” Dr. G.K. Namazie

 Roberto Cabello-Argandoña has been writing about the French Intervention in Mexico for many years. His main preoccupation has constantly been to bring to light the main historical lessons from a failed foreign occupation, the ever presence of enemies within and without, and the resiliency of the Mexican people and their boundless yearns for freedom and respect.

Waves of Recovery: The Life of an Advocate of Latino Civil Rights. By Maurice Jourdane. ISBN: 978-0-915745-95-1 $26.95

This a riveting personal account of Maurice Jourdane--currently a Superior Court Judge and a member of Jerry Brown's California Attorney General's Office--leading to his legal representation and advocacy for farm workers and César Chávez's organizing efforts. Mo's life reads like a Greek mythic tale in which the hero suffers and endures moral and physical endurance in his quest, his now legendary legal fights and successes against the powerful California growers and agricultural interests in court. This biography is a testament to human strength in behalf of justice for Latinos. The success of César Chávez's civil rights movement and union organizing efforts cannot be fully understood without knowledge of the life and sacrifices of Maurice Jourdane, El Cortito. His legal successes, at great personal costs, solidified Chávez's leadership and prepared the way for the consolidation of the Farm Workers' Union, and ultimately for the farm workers to prevail against the powerful political and economic interests of the California growers. Roberto Cabello-Argandoña, Editor.

Latina Filmmakers and Writers: The Notion of Chicanisma Through Films and Novellas. Jenny Dean. ISBN:  978-0-9796457-1-6. $26.95

During the Chicano Movement in the 1960s and 1970s, Chicanas helped Chicanos achieve equal rights, while at the same time suffered oppression as women wihin their own race. In the 1970s, the Chicana Feminist Movement was founded to address the specific needs of Chicanas as women of color in the United States. Chicana artists began to write and produce works in which Chicanas were given a proper name, voice, and image. Soon, Chicanisma, a sense of sisterhood and feminist discourse, emerged to confront the triple oppression of race, class, and gender. Latina Filmmakers and Writers: The Notion of Chicanisma Through Films and Novellas examines the works of seven celebrated Latinas who collectively represent a 20-year history of Chicanisma: Chicana (a film by Sylvia Morales), Puppet: A Chicano Novella (a book by Margarita Cota-Cárdenas), La Ofrenda: The Days of the Dead (a film by Lourdes Portillo and Susana Muñoz), Paletitas de Guayaba (a book by Erlinda Gonzáles-Berry), El Espejo/The Mirror (a film by Frances Salomé España) and Loving Pedro Infante (a book by Denise Chávez). These works demystify masculine power and offer realistic portrayals of Chicanas and give them a rightful name, image, and voice in American culture.

"Dean provides a thoughtful and honest account of ... the concept of Chicanisma. Latina Filmmakers and Writers cleverly situates Chicana literature and film at the perilous yet unique intersection of class, gender and race ...and weaves a Chicana feminist theory and original oral history research " Guisela Latorre, University of California. Santa Barbara.

"This book deals with the voices and works of Latinas [whose voices]... must be heard since they elaborate on the concept of "Chicanisma."This is an important new book in the development of Chicana Studies and Latina thought. Kudos!" Dr. Luzma Umpierre, Human Rights Advocate.

"...This book... is a must read text for contemporary society. ...[it] will be most helpful in Chicana and Chicano Studies, Women and Feminist Studies, Ethnic Studies, and Cultural Studies in understanding the experiences and issues concerning diversity in a postmodern situation." Dr. T. Osa Hidalgo de la Riva

Clásicos de la Literatura Hispanoamericana Colonial en su Contexto Sociohistórico. Dr. Clary Loisel. ISBN:  978-0-915745-97-5. $24.95

Esta monografía va dirigida a los lectores que ya tienen un conocimiento básico de la literatura hispanoamericana colonial pero que quieren un análisis más profundo de algunas obras principales del canon. Este libro sobre la literatura colonial constituye un esfuerzo por reunir el testimonio de nueve escritores de los siglos XVI y XVII que han expresado algunas experiencias y vicisitudes principales de varios pueblos de Hispanoamérica para acercarse a su identidad nacional y artística. Seleccioné a estas figuras por sus contribuciones únicas a las letras hispanas. El tema central de este libro es la transformación y la "nativización" de los modelos peninsulares por los escritores del Nuevo Mundo. Es mi esperanza que, volviendo a estudiar a estos autores y obras, podamos comenzar a comprender mejor una pequeña parte de la enorme producción literaria de los dos siglos después de la llegada de Cristóbal Colón en 1492. Divido el libro en dos partes principales: "El Siglo XVI: Literatura de la Conquista" y "El Siglo XVII: El Barroco, Arte Hispánico". Al principio de cada parte hay una introducción sobre el marco histórico-social así como de las corrientes estéticas de cada época. Cada uno de los nueve capítulos se dedica a las biografías y al análisis de la obra de los autores seleccionados: Hernán Cortés, Bernal Díaz del Castillo, Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga, El Inca Garcilazo de la Vega, Bernardo de Balbuena, Juan Ruiz de Alarcón, Juan del Valle Caviedes, Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora y Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz.

"El lector se siente atraído a la lectura de Clásicos de la Literatura Hispanoamericana Colonial por la claridad de su presentación y por la curiosidad de ciertos detalles que me han animado a releer a algunos escritores de la literatura colonial, por ejemplo a Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz". Ramón Corro, Profesor de Español Emeritus; University of Montana.

"Este libro muestra de forma muy clara la transformación de los modelos literarios españoles realizados por diferentes autores en el Nuevo Mundo. Por lo tanto, puede servir como recurso útil para el profesor así como texto de trasfondo para el estudiante de letras renacentistas y barrocas". Robert S. Stone, Profesor Asociado; US Naval Academy.

"Clásicos de la Literatura Hispanoamericana Colonial , por el profesor Clary Loisel, es un aporte importante a los estudios hispanoamericanos coloniales. Es de gran utilidad para un público general y para especialistas". Mark Cox, Profesor Asociado de Español; Presbyterian College.

"Con Clásicos de la Literatura Hispanoamericana Colonial , Clary Loisel ha sabido abarcar las obras claves de la literatura colonial con la precisión y erudición necesarias para el especialista y con la claridad y llaneza para el gran público". Andre Moskowitz, City University of New York Graduate Center

Neissa, Peter A. 2004 210 pgs. (pbk) ISBN: 091574526 $32.95

It is the  true life story of Gonzalo Rodriguez Gacha, the drug lord of the Bogota branch of the Colombian Drug Cartel, this historical novel offers a factual and knowledgeable Colombian perspective that well connected Colombians have known for years: the real Drug Cartel, a group consisting of over two-hundred drug traffickers, met for the first time in 1976, not to discuss drugs, but to devise a solution to the kidnapping and murders inflicted upon them by the Marxist guerrillas. This led to cooperation on other matters --like cocaine.