This book is part of a broader reintroduction of migration as a topic of research in archaeology, one that moves migration from an explanation for change to a socially embedded process worthy of study in its own right. The book presents a set of case studies of migration in Mesoamerica, with a focus on the Epiclassic/Late Classic and Postclassic periods. It includes an introductory chapter on broader perspectives on migration in archaeology, followed by 13 case studies. The cases cover an admirable geographic range, from far northwestern Mexico to El Salvador; taken together they provide a striking view of the high degree of population movement that characterized the later portion of Mesoamerica prehistory. This geographic scope is noteworthy, precisely because it demonstrates the interconnectedness of Mesoamerica as a region. The studies are methodologically diverse, including primarily sherds-and-architecture archaeology (Healan and Cobean, Hernández and Healan, Fowler), linguistics (Hill, Romero), ethnohistory (Schroeder, Boot), art history (Turner), physical anthropology (Aubry), and mixed methods (Beekman). Against this diversity of methods, the absence of a chapter based on aDNA or isotopic methods stands as an odd omission.

The first chapter, by Beekman, provides an overview of current and historical perspectives on migration in archaeology. It emphasizes the distinction between the first-order goal of identifying whether migration occurred and the second-order goal of examining the broader context of why migration occurred and what its consequences were. It also briefly synthesizes the results of the other chapters.

Chapters 2–5 present various lines of evidence for Nahua migration within West and Central Mexico. Chapter 2, by Jane Hill, presents the controversial argument that Nahua-speaking peoples were fully part of the Mesoamerican cultural interaction area long before the Epiclassic period. This argument is based on the points that Proto-Nahua includes a substantial vocabulary for both tropical species and maize cultivation, as well as grammatical structures shared with other Mesoamerican language families. The third chapter, by Dan Healan and Robert Cobean, compares the evidence for three migrations into the area around Tula, Hidalgo: the initial colonization by Teotihuacanos, Zapotec enclaves during the Teotihuacan period, and the post-Teotihuacan settlement of the area by new groups. Although this chapter does not present new data, it does synthesize it well. Chapter 4 (Christine Hernandez and Healan) looks at the deep history of the red-on-buff ceramic tradition in the Bajío region of west Mexico and its ties to Central Mexico during the Late Formative (Chupícuaro/Tezoyuca) and Epiclassic periods. Nine of the volume's 16 color plates are photographs of ceramics accompanying this chapter, and as a ceramicist, I found the side-by-side illustrations of cognate ceramic types from different regions extremely useful. The fifth chapter, by Beekman, takes a multimethod—linguistic, ethnohistoric, and archaeological—approach to investigate migration during the (Epiclassic) El Grillo phase in Central Jalisco. This chapter has one of the book's most explicit focuses on “second-order goals,” with discussions of both migration as an ongoing process and intra- or post-migration cultural changes as migrants integrated into new communities.

In contrast to the etic perspectives in the preceding chapters, Chapter 6 (Susan Schroeder) examines the emic importance of migration narratives—almost certainly the same movements described archaeologically in the preceding chapters—in Nahua thought, as expressed in codices and early colonial writings. One of the more interesting points that she raises is the consistent role of women as brokers of access to new areas, usually through marriages.

The second half of the book, on Southern Mesoamerica, includes two thematic clusters. First, there are three chapters focused on Maya migrations. Chapter 7 (Scott Aubry) presents a morphometric analysis of dentition from a broad range of Maya sites spanning the Early Classic through the Early Postclassic period and of selected Central Mexican sites for comparative purposes. The results demonstrate a low degree of variability among Maya sites, consistent with a long history of internal population movement within the region. This chapter demonstrates the utility of standardized datasets, of any type, for the study of migration. Chapter 8 (Andrew Turner) examines the murals at Cacaxtla and argues that they are evidence of a sustained, likely multigenerational, movement of people from the Maya area to Central Mexico. One possible interpretation for this would be the presence of a merchant colony at Cacaxtla, although one that had an uneasy relationship with its highland neighbors. The ninth chapter, by Erik Boot, fits together ethnohistorical sources on the Itza migration with archaeological/epigraphic evidence from Chichen Itza and the Central Maya Lowlands. After Beekman, this is the next most methodologically broad chapter in the volume. It was refreshing to see a chapter on migration at Chichen Itza that did not focus on connections to Central Mexico.

The final two chapters in the book cross the ethnic/geographic lines that structure its organization by looking at Nahua groups in southern Mesoamerica. Chapter 10 (William Fowler) examines the archaeological evidence for the Pipil in El Salvador and adjacent areas of Central America as being migrants from Central Mexico. He presents a solid case for a site-unit intrusion-type migration, with the simultaneous arrival of nonlocal styles in multiple domains at Cihuatán, Santa María, and related sites. Chapter 11, by Sergio Romero, uses colonial Nahuatl documents from Guatemala to examine dialect-level differences and their implications for pre- and postconquest migrations between Central Mexico and Guatemala. He identifies two dialects in the documents: Guatemalan Central Nahuatl (likely preconquest) and Mexican Central Nahuatl (likely postconquest). Interestingly, neither of these corresponds to Pipil, as described in other sources, suggesting a complex palimpsest of migration into the region.

This volume is a useful summary of past and current work on later Mesoamerican migration, as conducted by U.S.-based scholars. Two weaker points are the lack of a summary chapter and the absence of contributions from Latin American scholars. The geographic and methodological scope of the book would make it a good choice for an upper-division or graduate course on migration.