Photo by Chris Meyer
John Nieto-Phillips
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John Nieto-Phillips, IU professor of history and Latino studies on the Bloomington campus, has been honored with the top book award of the Historical Society of New Mexico.
For the outstanding publication of the year on New Mexico history, Nieto-Phillips will receive the Gaspar Perez de Villagra Award for The Language of Blood: The Making of Spanish-American Identity in New Mexico, 1880s-1930s.
The Language of Blood argues that Spanish-American identity in New Mexico evolved from a medieval rhetoric about blood purity, or limpieza de sangre, as well as a modern longing to enter the United State’s white body politic. Coupled with the views that Mexicanos were non-white and “unfit” to assume rights and responsibilities of full citizenship, many New Mexicans, or nuevomexicanos, claimed Spanish roots, according to Nieto-Phillips.
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