Maderismo or Mixtec Empire? Class and Ethnicity in the Mexican Revolution, Costa Chica of Oaxaca, 1911

1998 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francie R. Chassen-López
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Mexican Revolution ◽  
Costa Chica ◽  
Neighboring State ◽  
Indigenous Movement ◽  
Revolutionary Movements ◽  
Rural State ◽  
Communal Lands ◽  
Social Upheaval

On 18 May 1911, the indigenous Mixtec peasants of Pinotepa Nacional, Oaxaca, rose up against the local cacique and ranchers who had dispossessed them of their ancient communal lands. Thus began not only the lone agrarian rebellion in the state of Oaxaca but also the only attempt to revive a pre-Columbian indigenous empire during the Mexican Revolution. The study of this remarkable episode situates Oaxaca, a state previously thought to be peripheral to this major social upheaval, within the main currents of revolutionary activity.As in the case of other revolutionary movements, the arrival of Maderista revolutionaries from a neighboring state, in this case Guerrero, triggered the peasant mobilization in Pinotepa Nacional, unleashing social tensions in the area. Although an overwhelmingly rural state in 1910, the Revolution in Oaxaca has generally been characterized by the absence of agrarian protest. Recent studies have found the precursor and Maderista movements in Oaxaca to be predominantly middle class, either urban or rural, seeking social mobility, wider political participation, and greater local autonomy. Nevertheless, the study of the events of May 1911 on the Oaxacan coast reveals a struggle that pitted an agrarian, indigenous movement against a middle class, rancher-style revolution.

Protestantism and the Latin American Middle Class

1971 ◽  
Vol os-18 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-28
Author(s):  
Charles F. Denton
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Economic Reform ◽  
Upper Class ◽  
Upward Social Mobility ◽  
The Church ◽  
Positive Force

The author feels that the development of a middle class in Latin America has been fostered by the effects of Protestant evangelism among the lower classes, which has spurred upward social mobility. But instead of becoming a positive force for social and economic reform, this middle class has become as reactionary as the small traditional upper class. This, together with the inability of most Protestant pastors to minister effectively to middle class persons and intellectuals, is a serious problem for the church in Latin America.

Portrait of a civic elite

2020 ◽  
pp. 18-48
Author(s):  
Alice Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
Standards Of Living ◽  
Dynamic Community ◽  
Class Community

This chapter sketches a group portrait of Belfast’s middle-class elite, taking in geographical, religious and class origins, education, wealth, and standards of living. A key focus of this chapter is the mid-century civic elite: that is, those people who dominated municipal life in Belfast in the middle decades of the century. The chapter does, however, go beyond this group, using various case-studies to branch into a much broader discussion of middle-class wealth, standards of living and social mobility. It provides an overview of the Victorian middle-class community as a whole. A fresh look is cast on suburbanisation and how it affected Belfast’s middle-class community. Suburbanisation is a phenomenon related to social mobility and demographic and economic changes, and as such is highly relevant when studying a dynamic community over a period of time.

‘An intensive study of – feet!’ in two films by Lois Weber: Shoes and The Blot

2021 ◽  
pp. 38-48
Author(s):  
Pamela Hutchinson
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Wage Inequality ◽  
Consumer Culture ◽  
Intensive Study ◽  
Lower Middle Class ◽  
Moral Compromise ◽  
The Relationship

In Shoes (1916), Lois Weber re-examines the relationship between shoes and social mobility. Far from guiding the working-class protagonist’s progress, a pair of worn boots trap her into a moral compromise, which destroys her hope of future advancement, either romantically or socially. Weber’s investigation into wage inequality, the rights of women and the influence of consumer culture via footwear continues in The Blot (1921), which revisits the same plot in a lower middle-class milieu and expands on the theme. Here, shoes are again a danger to women, but also an indicator of genteel distress and a cheap, impractical commodity, good only for profiteering rather than practicality.

India’s Middle Class

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanjay Joshi
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
The United States ◽  
Colonial India ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Political Entrepreneurship ◽  
Upward Social Mobility ◽  
Ordinary Folk ◽  
Social Entities

The category “middle class” can refer to quite different social entities. In the United States, it is often used as a synonym for “ordinary folk.” In the United Kingdom it references an elite with economic and social privileges. In India, “the middle class” acquired its own valence through a history that encompasses colonialism, nationalism, and desire for upward social mobility. At one level the Indian middle class was evidently derivative. Indians who wished to emulate the achievements and standing of the British middle class adopted the category, “middle class” as a self-descriptor. Yet the Indian middle class was hardly a modular replica of a metropolitan “original.” The context of colonialism, indigenous hierarchies, and various local histories shaped the nature of the Indian middle class as much as any colonial model. Composed of people—often salaried professionals—who were reasonably well off but not among India’s richest, being middle class in colonial India was less a direct product of social and economic standing and more the result of endeavors of cultural and political entrepreneurship. These efforts gave the middle class its shape and its aspirations to cultural and political hegemony. The same history, in turn, shaped a variety of discourses about the nature of society, politics, culture, and morality in both colonial and post-independent India. Contradictions were inherent in the constitution of the middle class in colonial India, and continue to be apparent today. These contradictions become even more evident as newer, formerly subaltern social groups, seek to participate in a world created through middle class imaginations of society, culture, politics and economics.

scholarly journals Stalled Social Mobility in Post-Soviet Russia

2018 ◽  
Vol 117 (801) ◽  
pp. 258-263
Author(s):  
Theodore P. Gerber
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The World ◽  
Soviet Russia

“The fall of the Soviet Union sparked hopes that a Russian middle class would emerge and thrive, but so far it has not.” Second in a series on social mobility around the world.

Nationalism and Class Conflict in Mexico, 1910-1920

1987 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-303
Author(s):  
Douglas W. Richmond
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Mexican Revolution ◽  
Class Conflict ◽  
Urban Workers ◽  
Mexican Society ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Upheaval

During the Mexican Revolution, nationalism and class conflict became two of the most pervasive aspects of the social upheaval that swept Mexico. Class conflict became so intense that workers did not respond to the bourgeois leader Francisco Madero after he assumed power in 1911. Emiliano Zapata and Francisco Villa also failed to attract urban workers or unite the nation. Venustiano Carranza eventually articulated a version of nationalism that responded to class conflict by promising to alleviate the grim features of Mexican society that required reform. In Mexico as well as many other countries after the nineteenth century, nationalism prevailed over class conflict during periods of crisis.

scholarly journals El ‘éxito negro’ y la ‘belleza negra’ en las páginas sociales

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 25
Author(s):  
Franklin Gil Hernández
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Black People ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Black Middle Class ◽  
The Social ◽  
Black Beauty

Resumen: En este artículo se presentan diversasreflexiones sobre las representaciones mediáticas de laspersonas negras de clase media y alta en las páginas sociales.Éstas parecen ser correlatos de la idea propuestapor Fanon (1968): “para el negro, sólo hay un destino.Y ese destino es blanco” (p. 6). Por un lado, el libretofantasioso del éxito negro se concentra en resaltar laexcepcionalidad: el ascenso social y la pertenencia ala clase media y alta no es ‘natural’ de lo ‘negro’, es unaccidente propiciado por la fortuna, la casualidad o unesfuerzo y sacrificios inusuales. Por el otro, el conceptosexualizado de ‘belleza negra’ parece centrarse en laidea de la blanquitud como capital cultural incorporado,refuerza la existencia de la ‘raza’ y muestra la capacidaddel capitalismo para aprovechar la valoración de las diferenciaspropuesta por el multiculturalismo. Finalmente,se analizan las estrategias para crear una Negro society,cuestión que implica neutralizar las críticas al racismo, ofrecerlas pruebas de su inexistencia a través de personajesejemplares y exitosos e insistir en el carácter meritocráticodel resultado de la ubicación en el orden de clase, cuestiónque refuerza la ideología de la democracia racial.Palabras clave: belleza negra, ascenso social, clase,raza, género, personas negras.‘Black Success’ and ‘Black beauty’ in the Social PagesAbstract: This article presents several reflections onthe media representations about black middle class and‘black elites’ in the social press. These representationsare related with the idea proposed by Fanon: “for blackpeople there is only one destination. And that destinationis white” (1968:6). First, the fantasy script of the ‘blacksuccess’ focuses on highlighting the exceptionality of thesocial mobility of the black people, because the socialmobility is an accident favored by the lucky or an unusualeffort and sacrifices. Secondly, the sexualized concept of‘black beauty’ focuses on the idea of whiteness as a culturalcapital embodiment, in the existence of the ‘race’and shows the ability of capitalism to take advantage ofthe value of the differences on the multicultural context.Finally, this paper analyzes the strategies used to createa Black Society, subject that involves neutralizing thecriticism of racism, providing evidence of the absence ofracism in society through exemplary and successful blackpeople in order to show the centrality of merit in placingpeople in the class order, and reinforcing the ideology ofracial democracy.Key words: Black beauty, social mobility, class, race,gender, black people.

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