Monuments Of Progress

A social and cultural history of public health in Mexico during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The book offers a fresh take on the history of medicine and public health by shifting away from the history of epidemic disease and heroic accounts of medical men and toward looking at public health in a broader social framework. It shows how new public health policies were instrumental in the 'modernisation' of Mexico. Adds to a small, but fast-growing body of literature, on the history of public health in Latin America and other developing areas of the world.

A social and cultural history of public health in Mexico during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The book offers a fresh take on the history of medicine and public health by shifting away from the history of epidemic disease and heroic accounts of medical men and toward looking at public health in a broader social framework. It shows how new public health policies were instrumental in the 'modernisation' of Mexico. Adds to a small, but fast-growing body of literature, on the history of public health in Latin America and other developing areas of the world.

For millennia, urban centers were pivots of power and trade that ruled and linked rural majorities. After 1950, explosive urbanization led to unprecedented urban majorities around the world. That transformation--inextricably tied to rising globalization--changed almost everything for nearly everybody: production, politics, and daily lives. In this book, seven eminent scholars look at the similar but nevertheless divergent courses taken by Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Montreal, Los Angeles, and Houston in the twentieth century, attending to the challenges of rapid growth, the gains and limits of popular politics, and the profound local effects of a swiftly modernizing, globalizing economy. By exploring the rise of these six cities across five nations, New World Cities investigates the complexities of power and prosperity, difficulty and desperation, while reckoning with the social, cultural, and ethnic dynamics that mark all metropolitan areas. Contributors: Michele Dagenais, Mark Healey, Martin V. Melosi, Bryan McCann, Joseph A. Pratt, George J. Sanchez, and John Tutino.

The impetus for the first edition was violent actions---the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017, which was touched off by discussions about removing a statue to Robert E. Lee, and resulted in the death of Heather Heyer. Since the publication of the first edition, both history and democracy are being threatened in ways that we were only seeing small glimpses of in 2018. Today, attempts to elevate new or more complex history has been met with vilification. States across the country have passed legislation to ban critical race theory from being taught in public schools and are seeking ways to limit what teachers are allowed to teach about slavery and race in the United States. These threats are unlikely to abate. As such, our responsibility as historians, community leaders, museum professionals, and citizens is to redouble our efforts to share human stories in relatable ways and to exercise our rights and wield our power whenever and however we can. The revised edition tackles the great issues of our time against the backdrop of monument culture and historical truth.