FRUIT, FIBER, AND FLOWERS:
TRANSNATIONAL COMMODITY CONNECTIONS FROM A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

 

Mayan workers drying fiber in Yucatan ca. 1910, courtesy McCormick Collection, Wisconsin Historical Society

North American agricultural commodities share interconnected backgrounds worthy of historical inquiry. Their stories are ones of transnational dependency, economics based on fluctuating markets, the role of the state and foreign policy, and they raise important questions on labor regimes and environmental change. These points, through an examination of the case studies of fruit, fiber, and flowers, will be the focus of Evans's presentation.

Sterling Evans received an M.A. in Latin American Studies and a Ph.D. in History from the University of Kansas. His research and publications have been on Costa Rican conservation, Mexican agriculture, and North American borderlands.