El automóvil y los mapas en la integración del territorio mexicano, 1929-1962 Translated title: The automobile and maps in the integration of the Mexican territory, 1929-1962

Abstract

Este artículo examina una nueva geografía social abierta por el uso del automóvil y los mapas a través del territorio mexicano por medio de una tríada conceptual que otorga una renovada perspectiva cultural a la geografía mexicana, a saber: el territorio de la circulación, el territorio visual y el territorio de la experiencia. El primero presenta dos variables de análisis: la difusión del automóvil con una perspectiva latinoamericana y los mapas de carreteras del país, entre 1929 y 1962, como promotores de un estilo de viaje y, a la vez, de otra vertiente del nacionalismo mexicano; el segundo examina la representación del paisaje a través de algunas guías de viaje que convirtieron lo lejano y desconocido en familiar y deseable y, el tercero y último, presenta la experiencia de algunos viajeros ante la expansión del horizonte a través del automóvil y el asombro que causaba la variedad de paisajes, en las tres principales carreteras abiertas del país: la del Pacífico, la del norte y la del Occidente. Esta perspectiva sobre la difusión del automóvil y el lugar de los mapas se integraron a los procesos de homogeneización e integración del territorio durante el siglo XX mexicano.

Translated abstract

This article examines a new social geography opened by the use of the automobile and maps in the Mexican territory between 1929 and 1962. In this temporary scenery, the construction of roads during a considerable span of the 20th Century has been identified as part of the modernization plan of the revolutionary governments of Mexico. This infrastructure furnished the opportunity of getting to know the wide variety of landscapes of the country as never before. A set of new traveling experiences was offered to the middle class at the same time that such diversity of Mexican landscapes caused different emotions through the "pleasure" of personally contemplating the rivers, mountains, trees, vegetation, the sea, the hamlets, towns or cities. A central element of this perspective was occupied by the automobile; its presence in Mexico meant a cultural novelty with deep effects and changes in the Mexican society of the 20th Century. The new technological element worked as a new mechanism that started circulating by the roads to observe the landscape. Because of this, we propose the application of three key concepts of space analysis: the circulation territory, the visual territory and the experience territory. Each one of them represents the many sides of the landscape as one study object, and of geography interest, as described below. The territory of circulation came about when the railroads decline started in the twenties and consolidated in the sixties of the past century. That is why in this section we first place a comparative perspective of the motorization levels through the number of inhabitants per automobile in several Latin-American countries having available ordered historical statistics on the matter. Results show a long construction of the automobile culture in this geographic region; construction that incorporated new communication and evolution forms of social groups. This set of elements was later related with the construction of roads and the cartographic production. In the first case, Mexico took important steps to pass from ten thousand kilometers to almost sixty thousand in the study period. This evolution, between 1929 and 1962, was registered, in the second case, in a series of maps showing paved roads and the national scale. The set of maps registered the evolution of the country roads and broadened the conventional or domestic freedom of transit to adventure beyond the Mexican capital and immerse in the landscapes around the country's three main roads. In the following section, the visual territory was examined. This concept leads to inquire about the representation of the landscape in some guides for motorists published in Mexico between the twenties and sixties of the past century. Attention is focused, in this point, in the maps, the photographs and texts in the pages of these consultation materials that, as cultural products, have the capacity of changing what is far away and unknown of the landscape in familiar and desirable among a middle class public that was getting deeper into that territory. In this section, two points are remarkable: first the preference shown towards the Valley of Mexico in the guides selected, making it the first option before the travelers sight, that is, to know the closes landscape thus transforming this region in the "nation's visual emblem". On the other hand, in each studied guide, the car's departure was placed in the central gate of the National Palace, where the National Roads Commission fixed the starting point of all the roads constructed in Mexico. Thus the center was set in the ancient Vice-royal building associating this historical site with the geographical origin of the country. This cultural reference was established as the place of national identity and the automobile as the icon of mobility disseminating modernity through Mexico. In the last section, the territory of experience was presented. Through it, the impressions of some travelers were identified as part of the traveling experience, the expanding horizon and the new visual experiences arising from a variety of landscapes crossed by the automobile, in the mountains, and towns of destination after hours of driving. For this part, traveler's testimonies have been selected that originating in Mexico City, enjoyed and appreciate the landscapes in the three main open roads of the country: the Pacific one, and the North, and West ones. This perspective of granting more attention to the automobile and the maps is integrated to the processes of homogenization and integration of the territory in the Mexican 20th Century.