Books, Arts & Manners

The Hispanics in the United States: A History, by Lewis H. Gann and Peter J. Duignan (Hoover Institution, 300 pp., $28.50)

This is a major, though flawed, work by two senior fellows at the Hoover Institution. The second half, which attempts to assess immigration policy and contemporary Hispanic life in America, is too often based on opinion and half-digested facts. However, the first half, which chronicles the history of Hispanic groups in the United States, successfully fills a gap in the literature, providing the first coherent picture of the emergence of America’s fastest-growing minority. The emphasis is on Mexican-origin groups, which comprise two-thirds of all Hispanics in the U.S., followed by Puerto Ricans and Cubans. The authors present only generalized facts about the less numerous Central and South American groups.

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Donald L. Huddle

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The Hispanics in the United States: A History, by Lewis H. Gann and Peter J. Duignan (Hoover Institution, 300 pp., $28.50)

This is a major, though flawed, work by two senior fellows at the Hoover Institution. The second half, which attempts to assess immigration policy and contemporary Hispanic life in America, is too often based on opinion and half-digested facts. However, the first half, which chronicles the history of Hispanic groups in the United States, successfully fills a gap in the literature, providing the first coherent picture of the emergence of America’s fastest-growing minority. The emphasis is on Mexican-origin groups, which comprise two-thirds of all Hispanics in the U.S., followed by Puerto Ricans and Cubans. The authors present only generalized facts about the less numerous Central and South American groups.