Revolvers and Pistolas, Vaqueros and Caballeros: Debunking the Old West (Intersections of Race, Ethnicity, and Culture)

This is a difficult book to rate. Figueredo (he has a Cuban background) writes well, clearly and with passion, and the topic is important. But I am not exactly sure what he is attempting with the book. One theme, the main one, is the erasure of Latino/a (that's his usual way of writing it) from the American--US American, that is--West. A second theme is looking at the heroic "cowboy" figure in film, including not only Hollywood but Mexican and Latin American film. This discussion of film is partly a wry look at how Mexican and other Latin American film has accepted the icon of the cowboy as white and Anglo, and Figueredo describes the Western genre as popular and even when using say Mexican figures, the hero is whiter than the bad guys.He also discusses literature, particularly novels and pulp fiction, and the themes of Zorro, the Cisco Kid, and Ramona (from Helen Hunt Jackson's novel). I'm not sure how to characterize his points; part of it is how these figures have become stereotypes, how they are connected to the erasure of vaquero and charro from the popular notion of the West. The language is still there but has been separated from its Mexican and Spanish roots: ranch, rodeo, mustang, canyon, mesa, California, Colorado, Nevada and so on.Obviously the several themes interconnect, but this is really material for two books, not one. That's why four stars rather than five. Figueredo discusses a lot of history, not always in chronological order, including such topics as the dispossession of Mexican Americans from land in California and New Mexico, the violence against Mexicans and Mexican Americans by the Texas Rangers, the 60,000 or so Mexicans who suddenly found themselves in the USA after the Mexican War, the Alamo, some Spanish and Mexican history, and more. The information is solid and you'll learn something you didn't know, unless you know this subject very very well.So, the book is a combination of bringing back the fact that the West had a brown face as well as white, a look at some Western iconic types in film and fiction, and an indictment of treatment of Latina/o people in the West's history. This is a good read, somewhat better at the start than the finish. I do recommend it, with the above considerations.

What does it mean to be an American - Figueredo's scholarship exposed significant gaps in how I understood our american union and culture came into being - the profound influence, starting in the 16th century and operating today , that hispanic culture and the 'anglo' response to hispanic or 'latino' culture has had on my understanding of what it means to be an American. Meticulously researched; rich in history, myth, stereotype, personal struggle and state level politics this book makes clear the importance of understanding how spanish, Mexican and in general latino culture and peoples shaped american geography, view of self, and setup many of the cultural lenses that are in play today when americans et al think about latinos - wether citizens or not. The pacing of the book is quite good- setting strong historical foundations going back to the conquistadors and deep penetration of spanish people and culture into huge swaths of what is now our 50 states, too the antecedents for and the consequences of the various wars between the US and Mexico, and perhaps most interesting the smaller stories that played out across Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California that collectively shaped how a nation operating under 'manifest destiny' came to view the tens of thousands of Mexicans (later Mexican Americans) that lived alongside the anglos.Figueredo does an excellent job in his pacing and his style makes good use of humor to make key points. As he moves through time he incorporates much of what we think of when talking about cultural literacy - literature of the day, major political figures, important stories that fired the imaginations on both sides of the border (e.g. the Alamo, Zorro, the California bean field wars etc), and as we approach more modern times the influence that movies and the movie stars themselves had on the attitudes of the day.The tone of the book is not preachy but designed to inform and 'to set the record straight'. Its very accessible content and once finished you can't help but come away with an updated view of American history and a greater appreciation for the contributions made by latinos and the basis for how the American 'experiment' in democracy is still being conducted between those of us who are 'anglo' and those of is who are not.