Factors in the Differentiation of Guatemalan Town Squares

Elbow, Gary S.

doi:10.1111/j.1468-2257.1975.tb00786.x

Cited by 5 publications

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“…Fuson (1 958) (Panama's central savanna) and Edwards (1965) (aboriginal watercraft) are exceptions. For all three realms, there are many articles on discrete topics such as domesticates (Gade, 1967;1970a;Johannessen, 1966); field forms (West, 1959); folk religion (Voeks, 1990); house gardens (Kimber, 1973;Fredrich, 1975); house types (Fuson, 1964;Hiraoka, 1972); language (Myers, 1973); plant use (Gade, 1975); plazas (Elbow, 1975;Gade, 1976b); tools (Donkin, 1970;Gade & Rios, 1972); toponyms (Incer, 1985;Berleant-Schiller, 199 1;Ford, 1991) and the other markers of cultural distinctiveness. The same can be said for cultural landscapes and areas (Pfeifer, 1981).…”

Section: Cultural Geographymentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Geography of the American Tropics: A Forty‐year Review

Mathewson

1993

Singap J Trop Geogr

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For a decade or so after World War II, human geographers working in the American tropics found socio-political conditions and resultant research topics little changed from those before the war. This was in contrast t o the Old World tropics where decolonization processes and the demands of economic development and new nation building produced divergent research currents, For the first half of the period under review, the American tropics continued to be the province largely of geographers with culturalhistorical questions grounded in natural historical bases. The legacy is H u m b o l d t ' s ; t h e practitioners most notably students of Carl Sauer or German counterparts such as Carl Troll. French and British regionalist approaches, strong in the region before World War II, survived less successfully. By the 1980s, however, broad pan-tropical currents of geographic discourse and debate had become established. New practices and theories were formulated and tested as North Atlantic geographers borrowed from antipodean innovators and others working in the Asian and African tropics. Since the 1980s, there have been greater efforts a t dialogue and collaboration with host country colleagues. As might be expected in this era of 'globalization', national research styles and agendas have become less evident. This paper offers a highly selective map of research nodes within tropical Americanist geography since the early 1950s. The selection of examples includes qualitative criteria, but more importantly, research that signify stasis or intensification as well as turning points and departures in the overall development of this literature. The contours of this history suggest s o m e highly evolved, even idiosyncratic enterprises, but in the main, it is an unfolding that suggests broad congruencies with human geographic work elsewhere in the tropics. and agricultural systems (Northern Andes) ', Mountain Research and Development, Vol. 2,

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Section: Cultural Geographymentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Geography of the American Tropics: A Forty‐year Review

Mathewson

1993

Singap J Trop Geogr

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“…A s a physical form and social space, the plaza is a common feature of settlements throughout Hispanic America that varies in type, form, and landscape characteristics (Stanislawski 1969;Elbow 1975;Gade 1976). The decision to construct a plaza resulted from a strong Hispanic identity among ethnic Mexicans in these communities and from the recognition by influential Anglo-Americans of the form's symbolic role.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A s a physical form and social space, the plaza is a common feature of settlements throughout Hispanic America that varies in type, form, and landscape characteristics (Stanislawski 1969;Elbow 1975;Gade 1976). We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.…”

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Plaza Towns of South Texas

Arreola¹

1992

Geographical Review

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JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. American Geographical Society is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Geographical Review. ABSTRACT.Most towns in south Texas were founded after the area had become part of the United States, yet plazas as traditional Spanish-American features were included in town layouts. The decision to construct a plaza resulted from a strong Hispanic identity among ethnic Mexicans in these communities and from the recognition by influential Anglo-Americans of the form's symbolic role. Plaza towns are more numerous in south Texas than elsewhere in the Hispanic-American borderlands. A s a physical form and social space, the plaza is a common feature of settlements throughout Hispanic America that varies in type, form, and landscape characteristics (Stanislawski 1969;Elbow 1975;Gade 1976). In the borderland region shared by Mexico and the United States, differences of this sort are more pronounced than in Latin America, in part because of the interactions of Hispanic and Anglo-American traditions.This article examines the plaza as a townscape form in the Hispanic-American borderland and shows that the plaza is diagnostic of regional culture identity there, especially in south Texas. Among the issues addressed are why some but not all Hispanic-founded or predominantly Hispanicpopulated towns of south Texas have plazas; the nature of plaza variability according to morphology, social function, and landscape characteristic in selected towns; and how plazas have functioned as landmarks of Hispanic identity in the past and the present. The plaza as a symbolic social form can be a telling signature of Mexican American regional variation in the Hispanic-American borderland. THE PLAZA IN SPAIN AND HISPANIC AMERICAPlazas in Spanish towns, unlike their Hispanic-American descendants, apparently were not social nodes, and the hub of the community often was some distance from a plaza (Foster 1960,47-48). Consequently, Spanish plazas were not usually common spaces; rather, they maintained specialized functions. Three types of Spanish plazas have been identified: market plazas, organic plazas, and monumental plazas.Market plazas, perhaps the oldest form, appeared as early as the eleventh century, were principally unplanned, and usually lay on the town periphery. Some of the earliest market plazas may have been cemeteries surrounding churches because of limitations of space in walled cities. Not uncommonly, market plazas emerged near city gates, immediately outside the wall, and, * DR. ARREOLA is an associate professor of geography at Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona 85287-0104. This content downloaded from 169.229.32.137 on Fri, 9 May 2014 01:14:53 AM All use subject to J...

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A century and counting: Geographical research on Guatemala in historical perspective

Mathewson

2006

Geoforum

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Factors in the Differentiation of Guatemalan Town Squares

Cited by 5 publications

References 1 publication

Human Geography of the American Tropics: A Forty‐year Review

Human Geography of the American Tropics: A Forty‐year Review

Plaza Towns of South Texas

A century and counting: Geographical research on Guatemala in historical perspective

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