The Idea of Latin America

Walter Mignolo

2005

Blackwell Publishing

The Idea of Latin America is a geo-political manifesto which insists on the need to leave behind an idea which belonged to the nation-building mentality of nineteenth-century Europe.

  • Charts the history of the concept of Latin America from its emergence in Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century through various permutations to the present day.
  • Asks what is at stake in the survival of an idea which subdivides the Americas.
  • Reinstates the indigenous peoples and migrations excluded by the image of a homogenous Latin America with defined borders.
  • Insists on the pressing need to leave behind an idea which belonged to the nation-building mentality of nineteenth-century Europe.