The Africanization of Mexico from the Sixteenth Century to the Present

This work is an Afrocentric analysis that acknowledges Mexico's African, Amerindian (herein after called First Nations), Asian, and European ethnic heritages.

This study introduces the theory of the widespread Africanization of Mexico from the sixteenth century onward.

With an insider's lens, the study reads the 'New World' Mexican experience as integral to the African Diaspora.

It unearths part of the officially buried histories of the multiethnic African lineage of Mexicans and thus recovers a fundamental part of the memory and human patrimony.

In addition to historical and literary sources, the analysis reaches to the core of various popular culture sites to exhibit the African ancestral legacies that make and recreate a considerable portion of the worldviews that inform Mexican cultural expressions.

Beyond appearances, the work focuses on the idiosyncrasy of the people who have shaped and continue to carve Mexico and Mexicanness with tamales, mariachi trumpet spirituals, and zapateado (a type of tap dancing) to stomp away the evil spirits following the way and the will of the Ancestors.