Making Mexican Chicago: From Postwar Settlement to the Age of Gentrification
Tuesday, February 28, 2023, 3-5PM | HG 1010
This talk details how the Windy City became home to the third largest Mexican metropolitan community in the United States. Professor Amezcua recreates the texture of Mexican diasporic life in the aftermath of historic migration journeys to the north that supplied endless sources of labor to a changing economic order from a consumer economy to a service sector economy. During the postwar years, Mexican immigrants and Mexican Americans repurposed old blighted neighborhoods into livable sanctuaries with familiar foods, goods, sources of mutual aid, and welcoming signage in Spanish, even as they battled segregation, redlining, and a predatory housing market.
Speaker Bio: Mike Amezcua is an Assistant Professor of History at Georgetown University and the author of Making Mexican Chicago: From Postwar Settlement to the Age of Gentrification(University of Chicago Press, 2022). He is an expert in 20th century US History, Latinx history, and urban history. He has written for broad audiences in The Washington Post, Chicago Sun-Times, Teen Vogue, and Public Books. Professor Amezcua serves as a member of the scholars’ council for the Mexican American Civil Rights Institute and was named a Mellon Emerging Faculty Leader by the Institute for Citizens & Scholars.
The event is co-sponsored by the Department of History, the Department of Chicano/Latino Studies, and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies.