Yale University Library Research Guides: Latinx and Latin American Christianity: Guatemala

Church History

Protestantism in Guatemala by Virginia Garrard-Burnett Offers the first history in English of Protestantism in Guatemala, focusing specifically on the rise of non-Catholic Christianity in relation to Guatemala's ethnic and political history.
The Soul of Development: Biblical Christianity and Economic Transformation in Guatemala by Amy L. Sherman Argues that, in Guatemala and throughout the region, religious world-views significantly influence economic life. Sherman explains how the change in attitude and behavior that accompanies conversion from animism to a Biblically orthodox world-view has improved the domestic welfare and economic status of many families.
Guatemala's Catholic Revolution: A History of Religious and Social Reform, 1920-1968 (Online) by Bonar L. Hernández Sandoval An account of the resurgence of Guatemalan Catholicism during the twentieth century.
Terror in the Land of the Holy Spirit: Guatemala under General Efraín Ríos Montt, 1982-1983 (Online) by Virginia Garrard-Burnett A historical account of the massacre of over 86,000 indigenous peoples in Guatemala during the presidency of Pentecostal Efrain Rios Montt.

The Guatemala Reader: History, Culture, and Politics (Online) by Greg Grandin; Deborah T. Levenson; Elizabeth Oglesby (eds.) This reader brings together more than 200 texts and images in a broad introduction to Guatemala's history, culture, and politics
After the Coup: An Ethnographic Reframing of Guatemala, 1954 (Online) by Timothy J. Smith (Editor) This exceptional collection revisits the aftermath of the 1954 coup that ousted the democratically elected Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz.
Mayas in Postwar Guatemala (Online) by Walter E. Little (Editor) Like the original Harvest of Violence, published in 1988, this volume reveals how the contemporary Mayas contend with crime, political violence, internal community power struggles, and the broader impact of transnational economic and political policies in Guatemala
The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War by Greg Grandin Using Guatemala as a case study, Greg Grandin argues that the Cold War in Latin America was a struggle not between American liberalism and Soviet Communism but between two visions of democracy. The main effect of United States intervention in Latin America, Grandin shows, was not the containment of Communism but the elimination of home-grown concepts of social democracy.