Steamships across the Pacific: Maritime Journeys between Mexico, China, and Japan, 1867-1914

During the nineteenth century, the transpacific world underwent profound transformation, due to the transition from sail to steam navigation that was accompanied by a concomitant reconfiguration of power. This book explores the ways in which diverse Mexican, British, Chinese, and Japanese interests participated, particularly during Porfirio Díiacute;az's presidency at the peak of Mexico's participation in the steam network: from its 1860s outset through a time of many revolutionary changes ending with the World War, the Mexican Revolution, the opening of the Panama Canal, and the introduction of a new maritime technology based on vessels run by oil. These transoceanic exchanges, generated within these new geographies of power, contributed not only to the formation of a transpacific region but also to refashioning the Mexican national imaginary.

With transnationalism, global and migration studies as its main framework, this study draws upon a dazzling array of primary sources to center Mexico's transpacific relations and the influence they wielded over the region at the height of the steamship period.