Inventing the Fiesta City - by Laura Hernández-Ehrisman (Paperback)

About the Book

The story of how the multicultural identity of San Antonio, Texas, has been shaped and polished through its annual fiesta since the late nineteenth century.

Book Synopsis

Fiesta San Antonio began in 1891 and through the twentieth century expanded from a single parade to over two hundred events spanning a ten-day period. Laura Hernández-Ehrisman examines Fiesta's development as part of San Antonio's culture of power relations between men and women, Anglos and Mexicanos.

In some ways Fiesta resembles hundreds of urban celebrations across the country, but San Antonio offers a unique fusion of Southern, Western, and Mexican cultures that articulates a distinct community identity. From its beginning as a celebration of a new social order in San Antonio controlled by a German and Anglo elite to the citywide spectacle of today, Hernández-Ehrisman traces the connections between Fiesta and the construction of the city's tourist industry and social change in San Antonio.

Review Quotes

"...a solid contribution to the historical literature on heritage tourism, public memory, and historical commemoration in the American West....It will be essential reading for scholars interested in regional comparisons of tourism and economic development in the United States."
--American Historical Review

"...well researched...provides a thorough examination of one of the South's most famous civic celebrations."
--Journal of Southern History

"Hernández-Ehrisman dissects her...subject thoroughly and objectively, yielding a balanced, perceptive study that will stand as a definitive treatment for many years to come."
--Southwestern Historical Quarterly