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This book examines the radical Left in Puerto Rico from the final years of Spanish colonial rule into the 1920s. Positioning Puerto Rico within the context of a regional anarchist network that stretched from Puerto Rico and Cuba to Tampa, Florida, and New York City, the book illustrates how anarchists linked their struggle to the broader international anarchist struggles against religion, governments, and industrial capitalism. Their groups, plays, fiction, speeches, and press accounts—as well as the newspapers that they published—were central in helping to develop an anarchist vision for Puerto Ricans at a time when the island was a political no-man's-land, neither an official U.S. colony or state nor an independent country. Anarchism in Puerto Rico was a unique entity in the movement's history. The anarchists expressed their concerns and visions through their own brand of cultural politics, which was directed against Puerto Rican and U.S. colonial rulers in order to promote an antiauthoritarian spirit and countercultural struggle over how the island was being run and the future directions that it should pursue. Alongside this was anticlericalism against the Roman Catholic Church.

Although media coverage often portrays young people in urban areas as politically apathetic or disruptive, this book provides an antidote to such views through narratives of dedicated youth civic engagement and leadership in Chicago, Mexico City, and Rio de Janeiro. This innovative comparative study provides nuanced accounts of the personal experiences of young people who care deeply about their communities and are actively engaged in a variety of public issues. Drawing from extensive interviews and personal narratives from the youth activists themselves, this book provides a vibrant portrait of a new, politically involved generation. The book examines youth civic engagement in Chicago, with particular emphasis on young people's attitudes regarding democracy. It considers the context of young people's civic engagement in Brazil, and the demographics of youth activists in Rio, the activities and organizations they are involved in, and their motivations for engagement. It also examines new paradigms of civic participation among Mexico City's youth.

This essay introduces the reader to the contents of the book, Global Perspectives on the United States, as well as to The International Forum for U.S. Studies (IFUSS) through whose work and connections this book has come to fruition. It argues that it is important to read “America” across and against the grain, and across disciplines and types of materials different scholars engage.

Election 2008 made American history, but it was also the product of American history. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Sarah Palin smashed through some of the most enduring barriers to high political office, but their exceptional candidacies did not come out of nowhere. This book explores how the candidates both challenged and reinforced historic stereotypes of race and sex while echoing familiar themes in American politics and exploiting new digital technologies. Chapters cover Clinton's gender masquerade; the politics of black anger; Michelle Obama and stereotypes about black women's bodies; black women's century of effort to expand political opportunities for African Americans; the lost legacy of Shirley Chisholm; why the U.S. has not yet followed western democracies in electing a female head of state; Palin and the political traditions of the American West; the populist resurgence in 2008; how digital technologies threaten the secret ballot; Palin's distinctive brand of political feminism; and the new look of American leadership.

New York City's identity as a cultural and artistic center, as a point of arrival for millions of immigrants sympathetic to anarchist ideas, and as a hub of capitalism made the city a unique and dynamic terrain for anarchist activity. For 150 years, Gotham's cosmopolitan setting created a unique interplay between anarchism's human actors and an urban space that invites constant reinvention. Tom Goyens gathers essays that demonstrate anarchism's endurance as a political and cultural ideology and movement in New York from the 1870s to 2011. The authors cover the gamut of anarchy's emergence in and connection to the city. Some offer important new insights on German, Yiddish, Italian, and Spanish-speaking anarchists. Others explore anarchism's influence on religion, politics, and the visual and performing arts. A concluding essay looks at Occupy Wall Street's roots in New York City's anarchist tradition. Contributors: Allan Antliff, Marcella Bencivenni, Caitlin Casey, Christopher J. Castañeda, Andrew Cornell, Heather Gautney, Tom Goyens, Anne Klejment, Alan W. Moore, Erin Wallace, and Kenyon Zimmer