Carmen Kordick
My dissertation, “Tarrazú: Coffee, Migration, and Nation Building in Rural Costa Rica, 1824-2008,” examines the history of one of the world’s most important coffee growing regions. Since the region’s first settlers arrived, 185 years ago, Tarrazú has been the sight of tremendous economic, cultural, and social change. To date, scholars have yet to explore this important community, preferring instead to contribute to the considerable body of works on the nation’s capital, San Jose. My dissertation will provide the first historical analysis of Tarrazú that looks at the region’s entire documented history. My study considers how changes at the local, national, and international level forged one of Costa Rica’s most important coffee regions, and how local residents in turn shaped and responded to those changes. I employ archival research and oral histories to foreground the experiences and perspectives of all segments of society: landowners, agricultural workers, migrants, business owners, public servants, and the clergy. By focusing on economic, cultural, and social change in one critical locale, my dissertation enters into conversation with literature on nationalism in the Americas. It reconsiders Costa Rica’s exceptionalist myth as a nation with no history of state violence, while also considering how ideas of race and gender defined modern Costa Rica. It also explains the widespread outmigration of thousands of Tarrazú residents during the second half of the twentieth century. Finally, my dissertation suggests the need for scholars to define Costa Rica in transnational terms. Indeed, my research demonstrates that the nation’s population, culture, and economy are no longer confined within Costa Rica’s political borders, but extend into the New Jersey émigré communities of greater Paterson. This project has received support from the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
My primary advisor is Gilbert Joseph, and the other members of my committee are Patricia Pessar, Stephen Pitti, Lillian Guerra, and Lowell Gudmundson (at Mount Holyoke College). My comprehensive examination fields included Modern Latin America, Colonial Latin America, and Latinos in the United States. I have been a teaching fellow for Chicano History and Colonial Latin American History.
