I. The search for "Lo Mexicano". The Mexican character / Joel Poinsett ; The cosmic race / José Vasconcelos ; The sons of La Malinche / Octavio Paz ; The problem of national culture / Guillermo Bonfil Batalla ; Does it mean anything to be Mexican? / Roger Bartra ; Mexico City 1992 / Alma Guillermoprieto ; Two Ranchera songs / José Alfredo Jiménez and Cuco Sanchez --
II. Ancient civilizations. The origins of the Aztecs / Anonymous ; The cost of courage in Aztec society / Inga Clendinnen ; Popol Vuh / Anonymous ; The meaning of maize for the Maya / J. Eric Thompson ; Omens foretelling the conquest / Anonymous --
III. Conquest and colony. The Spaniards' entry into Tenochtitlán and Tlatelolco / Anonymous ; The spiritual conquest / Fray Jerónimo de Mendieta ; Why the Indians are dying / Alonso de Zorita ; The Colonial Latifundio / Enrique Forescano ; A Baroque Archbishop-Viceroy / Irving Leonard ; On men's hypocrisy / Sor Juana ; The itching parrot, the priest, and the subdelegate / José Joaquin Fernández de Lizardi --
IV. Trials of the young Republic. The siege of Guanajuato / Lucas Alamán ; Sentiments of the nation / José Maria Morelos ; Plan of Iguala / Agustin de Iturbide ; Women and war in Mexico / Frances Calderón de la Barca ; The glorious revolution of 1844 / Guillermo Prieto ; Décimas dedicated to Santa Anna's let / Anonymous ; War and finance, Mexican style / Juan Bautista Morales ; A conservative profession of faith / The editors of El Tiempo ; Considerations relating to the political and social situation / Mariano Otero ; Liberals and the land / Luis Gonzalez y Gonzalez ; Standard plots and rural resistance / Raymond B. Craib ; Offer of the crown to Maximilian / Junta of Conservative Notables ; A letter from Mexico / Empress Carlotta ; The triumph of the Republic / Benito Juárez ; Pofirio Díaz visits Yucatán / Channing Arnold and Frederick J. Tabor Frost ; Scenes from a lumber camp / B. Traven ; President Díaz, hero of the Americas / James Creelman ; Gift of the Skeletons / Anonymous --
Special section. Mexican history in photographs / John Mraz --
V. Revolution. Land and liberty / Ricardo Flores Magón ; Plan of Ayala / Emiliano Zapata and others ; The restoration of the Ejido / Luis Cabrera ; Zapatistas in the Palace / Martin Luis Guzmán ; Mexico has been turned into a hell / William O. Jenkins ; Pancho Villa / John Reed ; La Punitiva / Anonymous ; Pedro Martinez / Oscar Lewis ; Juan the Chamula / Ricardo Pozas ; The Constitution of 1917: articles 27 and 123 ; An Agrarian encounter / Rosalie Evans ; Ode to Cuauhtémoc / Carlos Pellicer ; The socialist abc's / Anonymous ; Mexico must become a nation of institutions and laws / Plutarco Elias Calles ; The formation of the single-party state / Carlos Fuentes ; The rough and tumble career of Pedro Crespo / Gilbert M. Joseph and Allen Wells ; A convention in Zacapu / Salvador Lemus Fernández ; The Agrarian reform in La Laguna / Fernando Benitez ; The oil expropriation / Josephus Daniels ; Cárdenas and the masses / Arturo Anguiano --
VI. The perils of modernity. They gave us the land / Juan Rulfo ; Mexico's crisis / Daniel Cosío Villegas ; Struggles of a Campesino leader / Rubén Jaramillo ; Art and corruption / David Alfaro Siqueiros ; The two faces of Acapulco during the Golden Age / Andrew Sackett ; Mexico / Sid Tepper and Roy c. Bennett ; The dark deeds of "El Negro" Durazo / José González G. ; The sinking city Joel Simon ; Ciudad Nezahualcóyotl / Roberto Vallarino ; Modesta Gómez / Rosario Castellanos --
VII. From the ruins. The student movement of 1968 / Elena Poniatowska ; El Santo's strange career / Anne Rubenstein ; After the earthquake / Victims' Coordinating Council ; Letters to Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas / Anonymous ; Corazón del Rocanrol / Rubén Martinez ; I don't believe them at all / Maldita Vecindad y los Hijos del Quinto Patio ; Identity hour / Carlos Monsiváis ; The COCEI of Juchitán, Oaxaca: two documents / Leopoldo de Gyves de la Cruz and COCEI ; Women of Juchitán / Jeffrey W. Rubin ; EZLN demands at the dialogue table / Zapatista Army of National Liberation ; The long journey from despair to hope / Subcomandante Marcos ; T Tzotzil Chronicle / Marián Peres Tsu ; Debtors' revenge / Heather Williams ; Mexicans would not be bought, coerced / Wayne A. Cornelius --
VIII. The border and beyond. Plan of San Diego / Anonymous ; The Mexican connection / Rudolfo Acuña ; The Maquiladoras / William Langewiesche ; Dompe Days / Luis Alberto Urrea ; Pedro P., Coyote / Judith Adler Hellman ; There's a party going on in Texas / Anonymous ; Two poems about immigrant life / Pat Mora and Gina Valdés ; The deadly harvest of the Sierra Madre / Alan Weisman ; Two songs about drug smuggling / Salomé Gutiérrez and Paulino Vargas ; The new world border / Guillermo Gómez-Peña.
