Frances L. Ramos
Associate Professor
Contact
Office: SOC 215
Phone: 813/974-3371
Fax: 813-974-6228
Email: framos@usf.edu
Links
Education
Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin, 2005
I teach a variety of courses focusing on the political and religious culture of colonial and modern Latin America, including "Colonial Latin America," "Latin America in the Age of Revolution," and "Modern Mexico" as well as "Latin American Civilization" (LAH 2020), a broad survey that fulfills the Cultural Diversity component of the Liberals Arts General Education Course Requirements. My courses focus just as much on large transformations (such as conquest, revolution, and military dictatorship) as on the way everyday people responded to political, economic, and social change. In all of my undergraduate courses, students develop critical thinking skills by analyzing an array of primary sources, and in "Latin America in the Age of Revolution" and "Modern Mexico" these might include photographs, cartoons, song lyrics, and even popular films. Recently, I have started offering a graduate seminar titled "Readings in Colonial Latin America" focusing on a category of analysis central to the historiography of Latin America (such as race, gender, or religion). Students are exposed to an array of subcategories in the historiography and are encouraged to work on individual projects related in some way to their specific research interests.
Research
My research has focused on the political culture of late seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Puebla de los Ángeles, Mexico, the viceroyalty of New Spain's “second city” in prestige and importance. My book Identity, Ritual and Power in Colonial Puebla analyzes how spectacular public ceremonies reinforced allegiances to city, empire, and Church, while also forging, testing, and demonstrating understandings regarding power and politics. My book will be released by the University of Arizona Press in the fall of 2012.
Much of my recent work has focused on how the organization and performance of rituals helped to bridge the distance between the Old World and the New. A saint, for example, might act as the patron of a particular guild while serving as a patron saint of the city and even, in a few cases, of the broader empire. A particular cult, with its accompanying festivals, could therefore reinforce several allegiances at once. Yet, as one of my recent articles also emphasizes, saints did not always work as symbols of social cohesion, but could also serve as symbols of political contestation.
Recently, I have begun two new research projects. The first focuses on the impact of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) in New Spain. Specifically, I analyze how after almost two centuries of Habsburg rule, royal officials tried to "sell" a new ruling dynasty to Mexico City's diverse population. My other project focuses on a ring of document forgers in mid eighteenth-century Puebla. I intend to use documentation related to this case as the foundation for a lively microhistory that should be of interest to general readers and undergraduates alike.
Recent Publications
Identity, Ritual, and Power in Colonial Puebla. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2012. view on the web: http://www.uapress.arizona.edu/Books/bid2380.htm
“Memoria colectiva y disensión política en la Puebla del siglo XVIII, México: el “motín” en honor del obispo Juan de Palafox y Mendoza” (“Collective Memory and Political Dissent in Eighteenth-Century Puebla: The “Riot” in Honor of Bishop Juan de Palafox y Mendoza”). (Forthcoming Winter 2013, Historia Mexicana).
“Negociar el poder y reafirmar la fe en la Puebla del siglo XVIII: los cabildos y la solución de los conflictos en el ámbito ceremonial.” In La Iglesia en la Nueva España: relaciones económicas e interacciones políticas. Edited by Francisco Javier Cervantes Bello. Puebla: Instituto de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades “Alfonso Vélez Pliego,” Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, 2010.
“Diverse Affiliations in the City of Angels: Promoting Urban Identity in Eighteenth-Century Puebla, Mexico.” Selected Annual Proceedings, Florida Conference of Historians (Volume 14: 45th Annual Meeting, 2007).
