Mexican Americans & U.S.: An Albion’s Seed for Mexican Americans

Much of what appears to be American regional culture is, in its origins, the culture of the people who moved here from abroad. David Hackett Fischer’s celebrated 1989 book, Albion’s Seed, made the influential case that the roots of the distinct American cultures of the Eastern seaboard and the Appalachians can be found in the regional cultures of England and the rest of Britain. The English people may look monolithic from a distance, but they brought their own internally distinct folkways here.

Are they the only ones? Joshua Treviño and the Texas Public Policy Foundation have set out to examine a similar question about Mexican Americans. Mexico is a big country, both in terms of territory and population, and a highly decentralized one with a long history of distinct regions and populations. Like America, it is divided into states (31 of them, plus a district for the federal capital in Mexico City), and the authority of the federal government over particular states has often been tenuous.

About the Author

Dan McLaughlin

Dan McLaughlin is a senior writer at National Review Online and a fellow at National Review Institute.

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Much of what appears to be American regional culture is, in its origins, the culture of the people who moved here from abroad. David Hackett Fischer’s celebrated 1989 book, Albion’s Seed, made the influential case that the roots of the distinct American cultures of the Eastern seaboard and the Appalachians can be found in the regional cultures of England and the rest of Britain. The English people may look monolithic from a distance, but they brought their own internally distinct folkways here.

Are they the only ones? Joshua Treviño and the Texas Public Policy Foundation have set out to examine a similar question about Mexican Americans. Mexico is a big country, both in terms of territory and population, and a highly decentralized one with a long history of distinct regions and populations. Like America, it is divided into states (31 of them, plus a district for the federal capital in Mexico City), and the authority of the federal government over particular states has often been tenuous.