This book tells the story of colonial Latin America through the lives of common people, helping students comprehend the triumphs and tragedies of daily life and its impact on the region's history.

Stretching from Mexico to Buenos Aires, from the Pacific coast across the Atlantic, from the first colonial invasions to independence, these stories knit together common themes. The narratives include a Mayan noblemen turned translator for a Spanish torturer, a Eurafrican woman healer accused of witchcraft, a missionary caught between native rebels and corrupt administrators, an Afro-Brazilian maroon leader trying to hold on to freedom, and a mestizo crown loyalist weary of independence under the new Creole elite.

This new edition provides vital updates and tackles new topics:
- Expanded scope to consider more trans-Atlantic and trans-regional individuals who gave colonial Latin America its uniquely wide-reaching cultural and geographic scope
- Spaces between different empires
- The complex role of religion and religious figures as cultural and political intermediaries
- An additional chapter bridging the pre-Columbian period to post-invasion colonial rule
- Updated terminology and historiography reflective of the changes in the field since the previous edition

While most texts for use in the classroom approach political, social, religious, and economic trends through top-down narratives, this volume demonstrates how the ordinary lives of Latin Americans shaped the region. These engaging, easy-to-read chapters help students understand the complex interaction of race, gender, ethnicity, and religiosity in the colonial setting.