African Mexicans and the Discourse on Modern Nation

In African Mexicans and the Discourse on Modern Nation, author Marco Polo Hernández Cuevas explores how the Africaness of Mexican mestizaje was erased from the national memory and identity and how national African ethnic contributions were plagiarized by the criollo elite in modern Mexico.

The book cites the concept of a Caucasian standard of beauty prevalent in narrative, film, and popular culture in the period between 1920 and 1968, which the author dubs as the "cultural phase of the Mexican Revolution." The author also delves into how criollo elite disenfranchised non-white Mexicans as a whole by institutionalizing a Eurocentric myth whereby Mexicans learned to negate part of their ethnic makeup.

During this time period, wherever African Mexicans, visibly black or not, are mentioned, they appear as "mestizo," many of them oblivious of their African heritage, and others part of a willing movement toward becoming "white." This analysis adopts as a critical foundation Richard Jackson's ideas about black phobia and the white aesthetic, as well as James Snead's coding of blacks.