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In my conversation this week with my colleague Amada Beltran, we talk about some of the biggest problems in history: the state, modernity, and how on earth do historians come to understand the past? Amada talks about how her careful study of wills showed her a key moment in the relationship between the family, the church, and the modern state in 19th century Mexico. I won't spoil it for you here, but it's a great piece of detective work. Listen if you're curious about modernity, the Catholic Church, the Habsburgs, or the Emperor Maximilian, the crummy Bourbon monarch of Mexico.
Reading Recommendations:
Nara Milanich, Children of Fate: Childhood, Class, and the State in Chile, 1850-1930 (Duke University Press, 2009)
Nara Milanich, “Whither Family History? A Road Map from Latin America,” American Historical Review 112:2, April 2007, 439-458.
Tanya Evans, "Secrets and Lies: the Radical Potential of Family History", History Workshop Journal