Claudio Lomnitz was born in
Chile. His parents, the Chilean
geophysicist,
Cinna Lomnitz, and the French-born Chilean-Mexican anthropologist,
Larissa Adler Lomnitz, married in 1950. His siblings include Jorge (1954-1993), Alberto, and Tania. Lomnitz received his undergraduate degree from
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana Iztapalapa. In 1982,
Fondo de Cultura Económica published his first book, a study of politics and cultural change in
Tepoztlán entitled
Evolución de una sociedad rural. His interest in
Latin America developed further as he pursued a Ph.D. in anthropology from
Stanford University, receiving it in 1987. His next book,
Exits from the Labyrinth: Culture and Ideology in the Mexican National Space, published by
University of California Press in 1992, was an important intervention in the study of nationalist ideology and its relationship to the involved community. He has since written five other books on Mexico:
Modernidad Indiana: 9 ensayos sobre nación y mediación en México published by Planeta in 1999;
Deep Mexico, Silent Mexico: An Anthropology of Nationalism published by
University of Minnesota Press in 2001 and described by Lomnitz as an expansion of ideas explored in
Exits from the Labyrinth;
Death and the Idea of Mexico, published by Zone Books in 2005; "El Antisemitismo y la ideología de la Revolución Mexicana" (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2010); and, with Friedrich Katz, "El porfiriato y la revolución en la historia de México: Una conversación" (Ediciones ERA, 2012). "The Return of Comrade Ricardo Flores Magón" (Zone Books, 2014) won the Latin American Studies Association book prize for the best book in the humanities on Mexico, a Spanish translation by Jorge Aguilar Mora appeared with Editorial Era in 2016. His most recent books include "Nuestra América: My Family in the Vertigo of Translation" (Other Press, 2021), "El tejido social rasgado" (Ediciones ERA, 2021; "Para una teología política del crimen organizado" (Ediciones ERA, 2023); and "Sovereignty and Extortion: A New State Form in Mexico" (Duke University Press, 2024). Some of Lomnitz's essays have been published in short book format as well: "El antisemitismo y la ideología de la revolución Mexicana" (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2010), "El primer linchamiento de México (El Colegio de México, 2015), and "La nación desdibujada: México en trece ensayos" (Editorial Malpaso, 2016). He also edited a volume commemorating the 50th anniversary of Mexico's 1968 movement: "1968-2018: Cincuenta años de historia colectiva" (UNAM, 2018). Lomnitz was for many years a regular collaborator at
La Jornada, a daily newspaper published in Mexico City, and has a monthly column in
Nexos; for some years he also wrote a weekly column in
Excélsior, a daily newspaper published in Mexico City. In 2010, he was awarded Mexico's National Drama Award for a historical play titled "El verdadero Bulnes," co-authored with his brother, Alberto Lomnitz. Claudio and Alberto Lomnitz co-authored a second play, a political musical, together with composer Leonardo Soqui, titled "La Gran Familia", that was launched at the 2018 edition of the Festival Internacional Cervantino, with Mexico's Compañía Nacional de Teatro. Claudio Lomnitz was fellow at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin in 2011–12, and a recipient of the Humboldt Research Award in 2016. ==References==