Academia Mexicana de la Historia

Academia Mexicana de la Historia
Name	Academia Mexicana de la Historia
Established	1916
Location	Mexico City
Type	Learned society

Contents

Academia Mexicana de la Historia is a Mexican learned society dedicated to the study and promotion of Mexican history founded in 1916 in Mexico City. It has engaged with institutions such as the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, the Biblioteca Nacional de México and the Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas while interacting with figures linked to the Porfiriato, the Mexican Revolution, the Constitution of 1917 and the Carranza administration.

History

The academy emerged amid debates involving intellectuals from the eras of Porfirio Díaz, Francisco I. Madero, Victoriano Huerta, Venustiano Carranza and Álvaro Obregón and responded to historiographical currents associated with scholars such as Justo Sierra, Manuel Gamio, José Vasconcelos, Ignacio Manuel Altamirano, Leopoldo Zea and Vicente Riva Palacio. Its founding in 1916 followed initiatives linked to the Centennial of Independence of Mexico celebrations and dialogues with the Real Academia de la Historia of Madrid, the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres and the Royal Society of Canada. Over the twentieth century the academy intersected with controversies around interpretations promoted by Porfirismo, indigenismo, revisionist scholarship, and debates involving historians like Alfonso Caso, Miguel León-Portilla, Enrique Florescano, Silvio Zavala and Carlos Monsiváis. The institution adapted through administrations of Lázaro Cárdenas, Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, Luis Echeverría, Carlos Salinas de Gortari and Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The academy is organized in seats often occupied by corresponding and perpetual members drawn from universities and museums such as the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, the Instituto Mora, the Museo Nacional de Antropología, the Museo Nacional de Historia Castilaya and the Biblioteca Nacional de Antropología e Historia. Membership has included historians and intellectuals like Federico Gamboa, Alberto Ruy Sánchez, Luis González y González, Guillermo Tovar de Teresa, Rodolfo Aguirre Tinoco, Arturo Warman, José Luis Martínez, Emilio Uranga, Rosaura Zapata and Rene Acuña. The academy maintains links with foreign bodies such as the Real Academia Española, the Academia Brasileira de Letras, the American Historical Association, the Royal Historical Society and the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas.

Regular activities include seminars, public lectures, conferences and colloquia convened with partners including the Universidad Iberoamericana, the El Colegio de México, the Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, the Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes and the Secretaría de Cultura. The academy publishes proceedings, monographs and bulletins comparable in influence to titles produced by Historia Mexicana, Anales de la Universidad de México, Revista de Historia de América and collaborative volumes with the Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas; notable contributors have included Silvia Marina Arrom, Jean Meyer, Eric Van Young, Alan Knight and Stanley Payne. It organizes congresses addressing topics such as the Mexican–American War, the Cristero War, the Battle of Puebla, the Caste War of Yucatán and the French Intervention in Mexico, and produces critical editions and annotated reprints of works by authors like Ignacio Ramírez, Mariano Azuela, Lucas Alamán and José María Morelos.

The academy curates documentary collections, manuscript holdings and printed ephemera that complement repositories in the Archivo General de la Nación, the Hemeroteca Nacional de México and the Archivo Histórico del Distrito Federal. Holdings include correspondence with figures such as Porfirio Díaz, Benito Juárez, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, Agustín de Iturbide, Antonio López de Santa Anna and Guadalupe Victoria, as well as maps, decrees and parish records tied to the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the Virreinato de Nueva España and the Bourbon Reforms. The collections support research on topics ranging from colonial institutions documented in the Archivo General de Indias to nineteenth-century diplomatic exchanges reflected in papers concerning the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the Treaty of Córdoba and correspondence with diplomats like Matías Romero and Juan Almonte.

The academy confers prizes, medals and recognitions honoring contributions to historiography and archival preservation, echoing awards given by institutions such as the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, the Fundación Ortega y Gasset, the Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes, the Premio Xavier Villaurrutia and the National Prize for Arts and Sciences (Mexico). Laureates and honorees have included historians and writers like Carlos Fuentes, Octavio Paz, Elena Poniatowska, Fernando Benítez, Jaime Labastida and Josefina Zoraida Vázquez. The academy also awards distinctions commemorating figures such as Leandro Izaguirre, Ignacio Manuel Altamirano and Ricardo Flores Magón.

The academy has influenced curriculum debates at the Secretaría de Educación Pública, shaped museum exhibitions at the Museo de Historia Natural and the Palacio Nacional, and collaborated on projects with the UNESCO, the World Monuments Fund, the Smithsonian Institution, the Biblioteca Nacional de España and the Library of Congress. Its scholarship has informed public history initiatives tied to anniversaries of the Mexican War of Independence, the Mexican Revolution, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo centennial commemorations and municipal historiographies in cities such as Puebla (city), Guadalajara, Oaxaca de Juárez, Veracruz (city) and Morelia. International partnerships have involved exchanges with the Collegium de Lyon, the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory and the Centro Studi Americani.