Serulnikov, Sergio 1961–

PERSONAL:

Born May 9, 1961. Education: State University of New York, Stony Brook, M.A., 1992, Ph.D., 1998.

ADDRESSES:

Office—History Department, Boston College, 21 Campanella Way, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467-3859; fax: 617-552-2478. E-mail—Sergio.serulnikov@bc.edu.

CAREER:

Academic and historian. Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA, associate professor of history.

WRITINGS:

Su Verdad y Su Justicia: Tomás Katari y la Insurrección Aymara de Chayanta, 1777-1780, Instituto de Historia Argentina y Americana Dr. Emilio Ravignani (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1994.

Subverting Colonial Authority: Challenges to Spanish Rule in Eighteenth-Century Southern Andes, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2003.

Conflictos Sociales e Insurrección en el Mundo Colonial Andino: El Norte de Potosí en el Siglo XVIII, Fondo de Cultura Económica (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 2006.

Contributor to periodicals, including Colonial Latin America Review, Hispanic American Historical Review, Latin American Perspectives, and Jahrbuch fur Geschichte Lateinamerikas.

SIDELIGHTS:

Sergio Serulnikov is an academic and historian. Born in 1961, the author completed a Ph.D. in 1998 from the State University of New York, Stony Brook. He went on to become an associate professor of history at Boston College, focusing on Andean society and history, colonial Latin America, and social movements. He published his first book, Su Verdad y Su Justicia: Tomás Katari y la Insurrección Aymara de Chayanta, 1777-1780, in 1994.

Serulnikov published his second book, Subverting Colonial Authority: Challenges to Spanish Rule in Eighteenth-Century Southern Andes, in 2003. The book focuses on the mid-eighteenth century rebellions of the indigenous peoples of the Andean region in south-central Bolivia against Spanish colonization.

Robert Jackson, writing in History: Review of New Books, commented that Subverting Colonial Authority "is well worth reading, although some aspects were disappointing," noting that "the author could have included more primary research in setting the social and economic context, especially on the issues of population growth and pressures on community lands." Jackson concluded, however, that the book "significantly contributes to the literature on colonial Latin America and the Andean region." Blanca Tovias, writing in the Australian Journal of Politics and History, thought that "the author goes too far in assuming that most participants in the rebellion were aware that they were part of ‘an anti-colonial uprising aimed at rebuilding Tahuantinsuyu’, the erstwhile Inca empire." "Nevertheless," Tovias concluded, "Serulnikov has written an important study that deserves an honourable place in the historiography of revolution and rebellion, peasant politics, and political culture."

Sinclair Thomson, reviewing the book in the Historian, commented that "Serulnikov takes advantage of rich ethnographic and ethnohistorical literature on northern Potosi while expanding dramatically" scholarship on the politics of indigenous peoples in the Andean region. Thomson called Subverting Colonial Authority "not only one of the finest and most important works ever written on the Andean insurrection, but a brilliant contribution to the historiography of Indian politics and rebellion in Latin America and to comparative studies of subaltern politics and insurgency." Writing in the Journal of Social History, Erick D. Langer mentioned that "this book finally gives us important insights into one of the major colonial Andean rebellions and has implications for understanding the effects of the Bourbon reforms in late colonial Spanish America, as well as the nature of peasant revolt. However, there are some problems. The major one is that the book is very poorly copyedited, with many typos and stylistic infelicities." Langer conceded, though, that "specialists will find this book a very useful, indeed essential, addition to the literature."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Historical Review, February 1, 2005, Ward Stavig, review of Subverting Colonial Authority: Challenges to Spanish Rule in Eighteenth-Century Southern Andes, p. 195.

Americas: A Quarterly Review of Inter-American Cultural History, January 1, 2005, Kenneth J. Andrien, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 511.

Australian Journal of Politics and History, March 1, 2005, Blanca Tovias, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 147.

Historian, March 22, 2006, Sinclair Thomson, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 164.

History: Review of New Books, January 1, 2004, Robert Jackson, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 60.

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, September 22, 2005, Lawrence A. Clayton, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 302.

Journal of Latin American Anthropology, April 1, 2005, Nils Jacobsen, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 241.

Journal of Social History, March 22, 2005, Erick D. Langer, review of Subverting Colonial Authority, p. 829.

ONLINE

Boston College, Department of History Web site,http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/history/ (May 7, 2008), author profile.