LUNCH AND LEARN SPEAKER SERIES
Explore Houston’s History with a historical expert while enjoying your brown bag or ordered lunch from Tres Market Foods.
Made Possible By: The Heritage Society’s exhibits, tours, events, and programs are funded in part by a grant from the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance. Funding for these grants has been provided by Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) as part of the federal ARP Act. Some of the exhibits and programs are also sponsored by the Summerlee Foundation, Humanities Texas, and the Bybee Foundation.
NOVEMBER 2026
🍽️ Lunch & Learn: Imagining the Provincias Internas del Oriente: Competing Visions of Texas
America 250: Spanish Texas Series
Thursday, November 19 | Noon
The Heritage Society at Sam Houston Park, 1100 Bagby Street, HTX 77002, Free parking 212 Dallas St.
Registration
Members: Free
Non-Members: $10
Optional Boxed Lunch: $13
Join us for an engaging exploration of Texas during the Spanish colonial era with noted historian Dr. Raúl A. Ramos, Associate Professor of History and Director of the Center for Arts and Humanities at the University of Houston. Dr. Ramos will examine the history of the Provincias Internas del Oriente (Eastern Internal Provinces), a vast frontier region of New Spain that included Texas and neighboring territories.
This fascinating presentation will explore the competing political, military, and cultural visions that shaped Texas before independence. Participants will gain insight into how Spanish officials, Indigenous peoples, settlers, and regional leaders imagined the future of Texas and the broader northern frontier. Through these intersecting perspectives, Dr. Ramos will reveal how debates over governance, identity, security, and settlement influenced the development of Texas and its place within the Spanish Empire.
Whether you are a lifelong Texas history enthusiast or simply curious about the state's rich multicultural origins, this Lunch & Learn offers a unique opportunity to examine Texas through the lens of the Spanish Borderlands and discover the complex forces that shaped the region we know today.
About the Speaker
Dr. Raúl A. Ramos is Associate Professor in the Department of History and Director of the Center for Arts and Humanities at the University of Houston. He earned his undergraduate degree in History and Latin American Studies from Princeton University and his Ph.D. in History from Yale University. A member of the University of Houston faculty since 2002, he teaches courses on Texas history, the American West, Chicano/a history, and Borderlands history. [uh.edu], [iuplr.org]
Dr. Ramos is one of the nation's leading scholars of Texas and Mexican American history. His award-winning book, Beyond the Alamo: Forging Mexican Ethnicity in San Antonio, 1821-1861, received the prestigious T.R. Fehrenbach Award from the Texas Historical Commission. He also co-edited Recovering the Hispanic History of Texas, an important work highlighting the diverse peoples and cultures that have shaped Texas history. His research focuses on identity, culture, colonization, and the evolving relationships among Indigenous, Spanish, Mexican, and Anglo communities across the borderlands. [uh.edu], [uh.edu]
Don't miss this opportunity to learn from one of Texas's foremost historians and gain a deeper understanding of the competing visions that helped shape early Texas.
