Biographical Note: Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado is the Jarvis Thurston and Mona van Duyn Professor in Humanities at Washington University in Saint Louis, USA. He is the author of seven books, including Naciones intelectuales: Las fundaciones de la modernidad literaria mexicana 1917-1959 (2009, winner of the LASA Mexico 2010 Humanities Book Award) and the editor or co-editor of fifteen books. His public writing has appeared in The Washington Post, Los Angeles Review of Books, Words Without Borders and other publications. He serves as editor of two book series: Latin American Cinema at SUNY Press and Critical Mexican Studies at Vanderbilt University Press. He served as the Kluge Chair for the Cultures of the South at the Library of Congress in 2021. Table of Contents: Preface1. Taco Tour2. Taco de Nada3. Pillows of Wheat and Lard4. We Have Never Been Authentic5. They Have Always Been Authentic6. Tacos Without Mexicans7. Elevated and Gentrified8. Every Taco Everywhere All at Once Further Reading Acknowledgments Index Review Quotes: "Starting with a tour of Mexico City taco shops, this book takes us so much farther, to Los Angeles and Monterrey, of course, but also to Berlin and Seoul. Ignacio Sánchez Prado serves up tradition and modernity, memory and authenticity, politics and identity, all wrapped in a fresh tortilla with plenty of salsa." --Jeffrey M. Pilcher, author of Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food "This book is both a fantastic crónica across a diverse global tacoscape, and an introduction to the vast knowledge of a master tacólogo. Sánchez Prado has written a book to be reflected on and savored, preferably with a taco, either basic or elevated." -- Santiago Vaquera-Vásquez, author of Nocturno de Frontera "In his taco tour de force, Ignacio Sánchez Prado pays homage to a beloved childhood food and a Mexican culinary icon. He moves beyond well-worn debates about authenticity and tradition to demonstrate how the taco was a central feature of a uniquely Mexican modernity." -- Ronda L. Brulotte, author of Mezcal in Oaxaca: A Craft Spirit for the Global Marketplace Publisher Marketing: Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. Taco is a deep dive into the most iconic Mexican food from the perspective of a Mexico City native. In a narrative that moves from Mexico to the United States and back, Sánchez Prado discusses the definition of the taco, the question of the tortilla and the taco shell, and the existence of the taco as a modern social touchstone that has been shaped by history and geography. Challenging the idea of centrality and authenticity, Sánchez Prado shows instead that the taco is a contemporary, transcultural food that has always been subject to transformation. Contributor Bio:Prado, Ignacio M Sánchez Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado is Professor of Spanish and Latin American Studies at Washington University in Saint Louis, USA. He is the author of El canon y sus formas: La reinvención de Harold Bloom y sus lecturas hispanoamericanas (2002), Naciones intelectuales: Las fundaciones de la modernidad literaria mexicana 1917-1959 (2009, winner of the LASA Mexico 2010 Humanities Book Award) Intermitencias americanistas: Ensayos académico y literarios 2004-2009 (2012), Screening Neoliiberalism. Transforming Mexican Cinema 1988-2012 (2014), and Strategic Occidentalism: On Mexican Fiction, The Neoliberal Book Market and the Question of World Literature (2018). He has edited and co-edited nine books, the most recent of which are Democracia, Otredad y Melancolía. Roger Bartra ante la crítica (with Mabel Moraña, 2015) and A History of Mexican Literature (with Anna Nogar and José Ramón Ruisánchez, 2016). Contributor Bio:Bogost, Ian Ian Bogost is an author and an award-winning game designer. He is Barbara and David Thomas Distinguished Professor in Arts & Sciences, Director of Film & Media Studies, and Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis. Bogost is also Founding Partner at Persuasive Games LLC, an independent game studio, and a Contributing Editor at The Atlantic. Bogost is author or co-author of ten books, including Alien Phenomenology (2012)and Play Anything (2016). Contributor Bio:Schaberg, Christopher Christopher Schaberg is Director of the Program in Public Scholarship at Washington University in St. Louis, USA, and the author of The Textual Life of Airports (2012), The End of Airports (2015), Airportness (2017), The Work of Literature in an Age of Post-Truth (2018), Searching for the Anthropocene (2019), Pedagogy of the Depressed (2021), and Adventure: An Argument for Limits (2023), all published by Bloomsbury. He is also the founding co-editor (with Ian Bogost) of Bloomsbury's Object Lessons book series. Author: Prado, Ignacio M SánchezPublisher: Bloomsbury AcademicBinding: PaperbackPub Date: 2025-10-16BISAC: Literary Criticism|Semiotics & Theory|Philosophy|Aesthetics|Travel|Food, Lodging & Transportation|Restaurants|Cooking|Regional & Cultural|MexicanWeight: 0.31 lbsISBN: 9798765135624ASIN: -SKU: SP-9798765135624
