Field notes.
Follow the connections across Stephen’s work. A book, an interview, a classroom: different ways into the same curious world.
Read Stephen’s essays on Medium ↗- Books / Forthcoming↗
Chasing Speedy Gonzales
A cartoon mouse opens a door into the history of race, animation, and cultural belonging. Archives and interviews reveal the artists and audiences who made Speedy both a contested stereotype and an enduring Latine icon.
- Teaching↗
Hearing True Stories: A Bushnell University Listening Lab
Students transformed podcasts-in-progress about Bushnell University into an interactive listening lab pairing audio storytelling with archival evidence and captioned visuals.
- Teaching↗
Called to Serve: A History of Missions at Bushnell University
A student-curated public history exhibit traces Bushnell University’s global mission legacy while inviting reflection on faith, colonialism, and cross-cultural service.
- Teaching↗
Inside the history classroom
A Bushnell University Faculty Features interview with Stephen Andes about teaching history, following curiosity, and connecting students with the past.
- Teaching↗
October 15, 1895: A Special Day in Bushnell’s History
Stephen Andes’s first curated pop-up museum invited students to turn Bushnell University’s archives into an interactive public history experience.
- Essays↗
Busting Three Myths of a Christian Liberal Arts Education
Stephen considers the purpose and practical value of a liberal arts education, beginning with the doubts its defenders face.
- Events↗
Speedy Gonzales in translation: Spanish-language dubbing of Looney Tunes in Mexico
A conference presentation on Speedy Gonzales and Spanish-language dubbing, within a panel on Mexican characters in American popular culture.
- Books↗
Jade, Daughter of the Wasteland
In a devastated Louisiana, a young survivor searches for her kidnapped brother. Jade’s journey through the Wasteland brings her into conflict with violent extremists and divided loyalties, as the struggle for her family becomes a struggle over humanity’s future.
- Conversations↗
Behind the mask, on In My Defense
Stephen joins the In My Defense podcast for a conversation about Zorro’s Shadow.
- Events↗
Storytelling in the Age of Disinformation
Stephen joined Desirée Proctor and Erica Harrell for a Latinx Comic Arts Festival panel moderated by Barbra Dillon.
- Conversations↗
The Mexican Legacy of El Zorro
On Latinos Who Lunch, Stephen and Babelito discuss Zorro’s Mexican roots and the character’s transformation in Hollywood.
- Events↗
Il segno di Zorro: presentazione del libro di Stephen Andes
An online book presentation and discussion hosted by IULM University with Massimo De Giuseppe.
- Events↗
Zorro: From the Page to the Silver Screen
Stephen Andes offers a behind-the-scenes look at how The Mark of Zorro helped shape action and adventure films.
- Books↗
Zorro’s Shadow
Behind the mask lies a history of borders, reinvention, and cultural borrowing. Andes traces Zorro’s Latinx roots and his influence on American superheroes, following a legend from Mexican experience into Hollywood’s imagination.
- Essays↗
Why I Decided to Drop the White Thinkpiece and Amplify Black Voices Instead.
Stephen introduces the work of Baton Rouge activist Myra Richardson and reflects on whose voices receive attention.
- Papers↗
Catholicism, Revolution, and Counter-Revolution in Twentieth-Century Latin America
A comparison of Catholic responses to revolution in Mexico, Cuba, and Nicaragua, including the development of liberation theology.
- Books↗
The Mysterious Sofía
An intercepted letter opens the story of Sofía del Valle, a Mexican Catholic activist whose work crossed national borders. Her life reveals how women shaped education, religious organizing, and Catholicism’s changing place in the world.
- Essays↗
Who Was America’s First Superhero?
An exploration of Zorro’s place in superhero history and the Latinx traditions behind the masked hero.
- Essays↗
How I Went From Academic to Agented Author.
Stephen reflects on the risks, practice, and persistence involved in moving from academic publishing toward a broader readership.
- Essays↗
Charlottesville. Does History Teach Lessons?
A reflection on historical judgment and the limits of treating the past as a ready-made collection of lessons.
- Essays↗
How do We Know What’s True?
Stephen explores evidence, storytelling, and the work of judging historical claims in a crowded information landscape.
- Essays↗
What is History? And Why it Matters.
Beginning in an introductory history classroom, Stephen considers why studying the past matters to university life and our future.
- Reading lists↗
Top 5 Things You Should Read on Immigration
A historian’s selection of books, reporting, and documentary work about immigration and the southern U.S. border.
- Essays↗
Zorro at the Border
A border crossing prompts questions about criminality, law, and the stories Americans tell about heroic rule-breaking.
- Essays↗
A Guy Named Harry Gringo Popularized the Epithet. No, really.
A look at naval officer and writer Henry Augustus Wise, who published under the name Harry Gringo.
- Papers↗
Vatican Foreign Relations with Latin America since Independence
An overview of Vatican diplomacy in Latin America, from independence movements through the Cold War and its aftermath.
- Books↗
Local Church, Global Church
Coedited with Julia G. Young, this collection follows Catholic activists across Latin America from the 1890s to 1962. Its essays connect local organizing with international networks in an age of political upheaval, industrialization, and secularization.
- Papers↗
Singing for Cristo Rey: Masculinity, Piety, and Dissent in Mexico’s Cristero Rebellion
An exploration of how Cristero corridos expressed masculinity, piety, political allegiance, and dissent during Mexico’s religious rebellion.
- Books↗
The Vatican and Catholic Activism in Mexico and Chile
Drawing on Vatican archives, Andes examines the tensions between Rome, bishops, and lay activists in Mexico and Chile. Disputes within Catholicism helped shape political participation, Catholic Action, and new Christian Democratic movements.
- Papers↗
A Catholic Alternative to Revolution: The Survival of Social Catholicism in Postrevolutionary Mexico
A study of Catholic social activism in Mexico, tracing connections between European organizing and Mexican efforts at social reform.
- Papers↗
El Vaticano y la identidad religiosa en el México posrevolucionario, 1920–1940
A Spanish-language article examining Vatican policy and religious identity in Mexico after the revolution.
Start with a question.
What happens when a story crosses a border? Who gets remembered? Why do fictional heroes matter?
Explore the books and reading guides ↗What’s taking shape?
A new book about Speedy Gonzales. A research project about Mexicans who served the United States in World War I.
A look at the desk ↗