John Phillip Santos was born and raised in San Antonio. During a decades-long exile in South Bend, Oxford, New Haven, and Manhattan, he developed a theory about South Texas: that it harbored a deep story about what America was becoming, a slowly unfolding plotline that emerged from the fateful meeting between Old New Spain and the American Republic. Today, Santos once again lives in his hometown, and teaches at UT–San Antonio.
Articles by John Phillip Santos
Severo Perez’s Complex Valentine to San Antonio
The filmmaker turned novelist revisits the city of his youth, in all its pain and glory.
Américo Paredes vs. J. Frank Dobie
For years, the great folklorist convinced many scholars and activists that the vaunted “Texas Man of Letters” was an anti-Mexican racist. Maybe it’s time to reconsider that judgment—as Paredes himself eventually did.
From East Texas to El Paso, Four Texans Reflect on Where They’re From
Over the years, Texas Monthly’s most celebrated voices have written about the places that shaped them, from the Panhandle to the border. We revisit some of the classics.
San Antonio Is a City of Metamorphosis
Though the city’s Tricentennial Commission has thus far been a dismal failure, creative residents have found a way to celebrate their complex history and promising future.
Return to Cotulla
My family and their hometown helped change LBJ’s views on equal rights. Did his later policies change the reality for those in South Texas?
Against the Canon
What are the best Texas books ever written? Here’s my list—now let the sparks fly.
The Education of Mi Hijita
My daughter is only two, but I’m already planning to teach her what it means to be a Texan—and a Tejana.
City of Dreams
Searching for the legendary past—and the cosmic future—in my old river city, San Antonio de Béjar.
Two Burials
Today my grandfather is buried in a family plot in Laredo. But to understand who he was and what his family was like, you have to know the story of his first burial, seventy miles away and nearly twenty years earlier.
Violence Is Golden
James Carlos Blake’s latest novel explores the sins of the grandfather.
Back to the Future
A trip through South Texas in search of the ghosts of borders past—and a vision for what comes next.