The nine authors in this edited volume employ various approaches to interpreting Afro-Mexican history and archives in order to examine the actions and lives of enslaved and free Afro-descended people as they navigated abolition and its legacies from the 1820s struggles for independence through the 1910 Mexican Revolution. The editors explain the contributors’ endeavor as one of finding sources and cases that show the struggle to make Afro-descended racial identities and terminologies produced by lettered elites or evidenced in the lived experiences of Afro-descended communities and individuals. These chapters cover many different regions of Mexico and unfold in the contexts of enslavement and emancipation, nation-state formation, and grassroots community building. Part I offers four chapters on freedom and colonial legacies, while five chapters in Part II explore (un)disappearing Black Mexico.

The index, contributors’ biographies, and chronology of key events in Afro-Mexican history help readers navigate this immense topic and dense academic chapters; a glossary for the many words in Spanish and more maps, images, and tables (beyond the 8 appearing in only 3 chapters) would further aid the accessibility of the text for non-specialists. The chapters are uniformly 25-28 pages long and compellingly written. The entire book or individual chapters could be effectively used in intermediate to advanced undergraduate classes, graduate seminars, and specialists’ research. The book marks an important advance in writing the history and identifying the archives of enslavement, freedom, and Afro-Latin America.