Selling Mexico: Race, Gender, and American Influence in Cancún, 1970-2000
type: CreativeWork
description: Selling Mexico highlights the importance of Cancún, Mexico’s top international tourism resort, in modern Mexican history. It promotes a deeper understanding of Mexico’s social, economic, and cultural history in the late twentieth century. In particular, this study focuses on the rise of mass middle-class tourism American tourism to Mexico between 1970 and 2000. It closely examines Cancún’s central role in buttressing Mexico to its status as a regional tourism pioneer in the latter half of the twentieth century. More broadly, it also illuminates Mexico’s leadership in tourism among countries in the Global South. First, it focuses on early tourism projects in Mexico in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It also highlights the changes in relations between Americans and Mexicans, in part as a result of the Good Neighbor Policy, during this period. The increased friendliness between Americans and Mexicans was important in Mexico’s ability to garner more tourism from the U.S. during this period. As a result, Mexico became more dependent than before on American tourism and tailored its hospitality holdings to American tourists’ market demands. This study also examines the role of ideologies in Mexico’s state-led tourism development, including Pan Americanism, internationalism and nationalism. It studies Pan Americanism and internationalism in tourism promotions abroad and at home. It also looks at the state's attempts to foster pride in national patrimony in order to promote a unified national identity and encourage more Mexican nationals to travel throughout their nation. This coincided with the government’s development of the “social tourism” sector in the 1970s. In this way, Selling Mexico expands the historical record on the state’s post-revolutionary nation-building projects and promotes a re-examination of tourism in relation to nationalism and Mexico’s cultural history in the latter half of the twentieth century. In addition, this study analyzes stat…
abstract: Selling Mexico highlights the importance of Cancún, Mexico’s top international tourism resort, in modern Mexican history. It promotes a deeper understanding of Mexico’s social, economic, and cultural history in the late twentieth century. In particular, this study focuses on the rise of mass middle-class tourism American tourism to Mexico between 1970 and 2000. It closely examines Cancún’s central role in buttressing Mexico to its status as a regional tourism pioneer in the latter half of the twentieth century. More broadly, it also illuminates Mexico’s leadership in tourism among countries in the Global South. First, it focuses on early tourism projects in Mexico in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It also highlights the changes in relations between Americans and Mexicans, in part as a result of the Good Neighbor Policy, during this period. The increased friendliness between Americans and Mexicans was important in Mexico’s ability to garner more tourism from the U.S. during this period. As a result, Mexico became more dependent than before on American tourism and tailored its hospitality holdings to American tourists’ market demands. This study also examines the role of ideologies in Mexico’s state-led tourism development, including Pan Americanism, internationalism and nationalism. It studies Pan Americanism and internationalism in tourism promotions abroad and at home. It also looks at the state's attempts to foster pride in national patrimony in order to promote a unified national identity and encourage more Mexican nationals to travel throughout their nation. This coincided with the government’s development of the “social tourism” sector in the 1970s. In this way, Selling Mexico expands the historical record on the state’s post-revolutionary nation-building projects and promotes a re-examination of tourism in relation to nationalism and Mexico’s cultural history in the latter half of the twentieth century. In addition, this study analyzes stat…
author: Butler, Tracy A.
language: eng
keywords: Mexico, Tourism, Cancún, Pan Americanism, Americanization, Internationalism, Nationalism, Gender, Social tourism, Race, Class, Capitalism, Jet Age, State-led tourism
date published: 2016-05
date modified: 2026-07-24T02:31:42Z
provider: University of Houston
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Houston

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/10657/1500