Founded in 1968, Review is the major forum in the United States for contemporary Latin American and Caribbean writing in English and English translation; it also covers Canadian writing and the visual and performing arts in the Americas. Review is published by Routledge. in association with the Americas Society, a national, not-for-profit institution that promotes understanding in the United States of the political, economic, and cultural issues that define and challenge the Americas today.

Review first brought the work of Latin American writers such as Alejo Carpentier, Gabriel García Márquez, and Mario Vargas Llosa to critical attention in the United States, and they were followed by numerous other important figures. Translators Edith Grossman, Gregory Rabassa, and Margaret Sayers Peden are among those who have contributed to Review. Issues of the magazine are developed from the Americas Society's literature programs, which often focus on specific countries, regions, or on more abstract themes such as urban voices, women's writing, or Latin American/Latino performing arts. Review has regularly included selections of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction; book reviews of newly translated titles; profiles of visual artists; and essays exploring currents in music and the performing arts.

Review has undergone various transformations, in response to cultural and economic currents over the last 36 years. Founded in 1968 as a compilation of previously published reviews of titles by Latin American authors, in the 1970s it turned to publishing special-focus issues on individual Latin American writers, including Borges, Neruda, and Paz. In the 1980s, Review was reconfigured as a high-design publication with substantial coverage of the visual and performing arts, broadening its scope to attract a more general readership. This trend continued into the 1990s when the magazine began publishing more literature and arts from the non-Spanish-speaking Caribbean. And in 2003, the magazine's title was changed from Review: Latin American Literature and Arts to its current one, acknowledging the true mandate of both the magazine and the Americas Society.

Since Review 68 (pan-Caribbean writing and arts, June 2004), Review has included scholarly research articles in addition to its regular content, and has been published online as well as in a print edition. These developments have expanded the journal's editorial scope and helped Review reach the greatest possible number of scholars and students of Latin American, Caribbean, and comparative literatures as well as general readers across the globe.