Insurgent Citizenship: Disjunctions of Democracy and Modernity in Brazil

James Holston is one of the most innovative anthropologists of citizenship today, and this book is a significant contribution to the contemporary literature on citizenship. It is also a solidly grounded and methodologically sound history of São Paulo, especially its peripheries. Clearly written, it will be of considerable interest to a wide range of scholars including historians, sociologists, and anthropologists at all levels from undergraduates to faculty.The notion of “insurgent citizenship” requires a conceptualization of citizenship as something that has been struggled over throughout history. More than merely a legal status of membership of a nation, citizenship is qualitatively different in different…