Charros: How Mexican Cowboys Are Remapping Race and American IdentityIn the American imagination, no figure is more central to national identity and the nation’s origin story than the cowboy. Yet the Americans and Europeans who settled the U.S. West learned virtually everything they knew about ranching from the indigenous and Mexican horsemen who already inhabited the region. The charro—a skilled, elite, and landowning horseman—was an especially powerful symbol of Mexican masculinity and nationalism. After the 1930s, Mexican Americans in cities across the U.S. West embraced the figure as a way to challenge their segregation, exploitation, and marginalization from core narratives of American identity. In this definitive history, Laura R. Barraclough shows how Mexican Americans have used the charro in the service of civil rights, cultural citizenship, and place-making. Focusing on a range of U.S. cities, Charros traces the evolution of the “original cowboy” through mixed triumphs and hostile backlashes, revealing him to be a crucial agent in the production of U.S., Mexican, and border cultures, as well as a guiding force for Mexican American identity and social movements. |
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Contents
Lienzo charro arena used for Mexican rodeo | 28 |
Jinete deyegua bronc riding | 34 |
Claiming State Power in MidTwentiethCentury | 39 |
Waiting for a parade in East Los Angeles 1951 | 55 |
Sheriff Eugene Biscailuz with his horse late 1950s | 63 |
Building San Antonios Postwar Tourist Economy | 69 |
Tailor making custom charro suits in San Antonio 1949 | 76 |
Creating Multicultural Public Institutions | 97 |
Claiming Suburban Public Space and Transforming | 133 |
Members of the Charros La Alteña outside Los Angeless Mission | 154 |
Shaping Animal Welfare Laws and Becoming | 164 |
Advertisement in Las Vegas for the World Series of Charrería 2013 | 187 |
Notes | 201 |
245 | |
261 | |
Denver Charro Association 1972 | 105 |
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Common terms and phrases
accessed activists American-style rodeo Angeles’s Anglo Anglo-American animal welfare Antonio Charro Association Archuleta association’s barrio bicentennial bill Biscailuz border celebrations Center charreada charrería Charros Emiliano Zapata Chicano Chicano movement City Council city’s civic Colorado Committee cowboy CSUN Denver Charro Association East L.A. East L.A. Sheriff’s economic ethnic Mexicans Eugene Biscailuz Fiesta film FMCH Folder heritage Hispano Hispano and Mexican Horse Tripping horse-tripping identity immigrant International Charro Julian Nava Julian Nava Papers L.A. Sheriff’s Posse labor land Latino lienzo manganas Mexican American Mexican charros Mexican migrants Mexican Revolution Mexican rodeo Mexico middle-class organizations parade Park participate Pico Rivera Pico Rivera Sports Pitchess political Prensa public space Pueblo Charro Association racial regional riding rodeo rural San Antonio Charro San Fernando Valley San Gabriel San Gabriel Valley Sheriff’s Department social Spanish state’s suburban Texas tion transnational U.S. charros U.S. Southwest United University Press urban vaqueros violence Western