Does Latin America Have a Common History

Abstract

Nearly forty years ago Lewis Hanke edited a volume titled Do the Americas Have a Common History? This book of essays sought to revive discussion of Herbert Eugene Bolton’s call for the writing of a “history of the Americas” in his 1932 presidential address to the American Historical Association.2 In his writing and his teaching over a half-century, Bolton promoted an approach that sees all of the Americas as part of a common set of historical processes.3 Although few historians have chosen to follow Bolton’s entreaty, and most historians of the Americas probably do not believe that we should try to write a history of all the Americas, Bolton’s controversial essay does force us to think about the commonalities (and dissimilarities) in the colonization, conquest, and development of all the Americas. I would like to pose a similar question that compels us to think hard about an enormous part of the Americas that we do generally assume to have a common history. I want to pose the question: Does Latin American have a common history? And, if it does, what exactly is that common history? I want us to take a hard look at Latin American history and rethink