Teaching Chicano
Literature
by Raymund Paredes,
University of California at
Los Angeles
I'll begin with a definition of Chicano literature. I use the
term "Chicano"
to refer to people of Mexican ancestry who have resided
permanently in the
United States for an extended period. Chicanos can be
native-born citizens or
Mexican-born immigrants who have adapted to life in the United
States. For
me, "Chicano" and "Mexican American" are interchangeable,
although some
scholars would argue, not without justification, that the terms
are distinct,
the former connoting a certain degree of cultural awareness and
political
activism about which the latter is relatively neutral. In any
event, to my
mind Chicano or Mexican American writing includes those works in
which a
writer's sense of ethnic identity (chicanismo) animates his or
her work
manifestly and fundamentally, often through the presentation of
Chicano
characters, cultural situations, and patterns of speech.
As a distinctive body of writing, Chicano literature is
relatively young,
having taken shape in the generation or so after the conclusion
of the Mexican
War in 1848. But the cultural forces that gave rise to Chicano
literature
date from the late sixteenth century, when the Spanish
conquistadores began
their exploration and colonization of what is now the
southwestern United
States. The Spaniards were remarkably courageous, audacious,
and, inevitably,
brutal, as the narratives of Cabeza de Vaca, de Niza and
Casteñada excerpted
in the
Heath Anthology
amply demonstrate; and they planted their
institutions,
particularly language and religion, throughut this vast region.
Coming to
America during Spain's Golden Age, the era of Cervantes, Lope de
Vega and
Góngora, the conquistadores were avid story tellers and makers,
depositing
legends, tales, and songs along the paths of conquest. In 1598,
Juan de Oñate
and a group of 500 colonists celebrated their settlement of New
Mexico with a
dramatic presentation composed for the occasion. In 1610, Gaspar
Pérez de
Villagrá classical scholar from Salamanca and a companion of
Oñate, published
his
Historia de la Nueva México
in 34 Virgilian cantos (see Heath
1;162-172).
The "historia" is one of the first examples of an emergent
literary tradition,
rendered in Spanish and evincing a Catholic sensibility, but
American
nonetheless.
The literary culture of the Spanish-speaking Southwest
developed spasmodically
in a harsh frontier environment marked by episodes of intense
cultural
conflict, first largely with native Americans and later with
Anglo-Americans.
Literary forms commonly produced in frontier cultures
predominate: personal
and historical narrative which sought to capture the epic
experiences of
conquest and settlement; and, of course, poetry of various types,
frequently
religious and occasional. The authors of such works, especially
in the early
days of Spanish dominance, were government officials and priests
who possessed
the tool of literacy and who typically regarded their mission in
the Southwest
on a grand scale. (See, for example, the selections by Otermín,
1:475-483; de
Vargas, 1:440-445; Delgado, 1:1211-1217; and Palou, 1:1217-12260.) Belletristic fictional works, particularly novels, were rarely
produced until
the cultural infrastructure necessary to support such writing--a
stable,
relatively well-educated middle-class population; the
introduction of
sophisticated printing technology; and efficient means of
distribution, for
example--came into existence in several Southwestern towns and
cities.
In a setting where education and literacy were often luxuries,
oral expressive
forms figured prominently. Folk dramas were performed from
California to
Texas. Traditional Spanish plays were sometimes adapted to the
particular
circumstances of the Southwest. In New Mexico, "The Moors and
the
Christians," which featured an abduction of the Christ Child by
the Spaniards'
mortal enemies, metamorphosed into "Los Comanches," in which the
kidnappers
were pagan Indians. Folktales and legends became widely
dispersed, many of
which made their way north from the Mexican interior. "La
Llorona" (the
weeping woman), one of Mexico's best known legends, circulated in
many
versions in the Southwest (1:1282-1283) and later became the
inspiration for
any number of Chicano works of fiction.
Until the mid-nineteenth century, some thirty years after
Mexican
independence, the literature, both oral and written, of the
Spanish-speaking
Southwest was not remarkably different from that created in the
Mexican
heartland. Although key cultural centers such as Santa Fe and
Los Angeles
were located great distances from Mexico City, they were visited
regularly by
Mexican traders, entertainers, and government officials who
brought with them
news and all manner of cultural information. Southwest Mexicans
knew about
cultural events and styles not only in central Mexico but in
Spain and other
parts of Europe. Indeed, the Spanish-speaking Southwest was
never as
culturally isolated--or impoverished--as American historians have
traditionally claimed.
All this is not to say that the region was not already
developing its cultural
particularities. For if the Mexican Southwest, despite great
obstacles,
managed to maintain cultural ties with the Mexican interior, it
also was
developing ever-stronger connections with the United States. By
1836, for
example, Mexicans in Texas found themselves not only outnumbered
by Anglos but
citizens of an independent country. In California, the residents
were visited
frequently by American trading ships; a good number of American
traders and
sailors stayed and married into californio families. By the
1840s, the Sante
Fe Trail linked New Mexico with St. Louis and experienced a
steady stream of
traffic.
The turning point in the history of the Mexican Southwest came
in 1848, when
the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended two years of warfare
between Mexico and
the United States and ratified the relinquishment of nearly half
of Mexico's
land. The vast majority of Mexican residents in the vanquished
territories
stayed in place, transformed into Mexican Americans with a stroke
of the pen.
Inevitably, gradually, the trajectory of Mexican culture in the
Southwest
shifted.
A good deal of literary energy was expended in chronicling the
American
takeover of the Southwest, a considerable portion of it by
prominent
Southwestern Mexicans who had supported American annexation only
to feel
betrayed and discarded. In Texas, Juan Seguín had been a
steadfast supporter
of Texas independence and even served as mayor of San Antonio.
Driven out of
office by the growing Anglo population, Seguín retreated to
Mexico where he
was arrested as a traitor. The rest of his life he alternated
between Texas
and Mexico, never quite at home--or accepted--in either place.
His "Personal
Memories" (1:1992-2000) vividly chronicle his cultural
ambivalence and
symbolize a culture very much in transition. Mariano Vallejo of
California
also had high hopes for the process of Americanization but saw
them dashed by
yanqui avarice and dishonesty. In the 1870s, Vallejo determined
to relate the
tragic history of California, his project running eventually to
five bitter
volumes (See 1:2001-2012).
As in an earlier period, the output of historical and personal
narratives was
complemented by a barrage of poetry, much of it ephemeral and
political verse
that appeared in the dozens of Spanish-language newspapers in the
Southwest.
Again,the versifiers were largely concerned with describing a
culture in
transition: they wrote about the threat to Catholicism posed by
Anglo
Protestantism, the decline of the Spanish language, and the
indifference of
government officials in Washington. A good deal of early Mexican
American
poetry was lyrical, romantic, and meditative, but a greater
portion was
created out of the conviction that verse was an instrument of
dissent and
political activism.
Despite the steady production of personal and historical
narratives and verse
in the several generations after Guadalupe Hidalgo, oral
expression still
figured more prominently in Mexican American culture, especially
the corrido.
A Mexican ballad form related to the Spanish romance, the corrido
(from the
Spanish verb "to run") served a function similar to that of the
blues in
African American culture. Together, the hundreds of Mexican
American corridos
constitute an informal social and cultural history of the
community, related
largely from the point of view of working people. In a tactic
similar to the
linguistic coding of the blues which protected their singers from
the censure
and retaliation of whites, corridos were composed in Spanish,
away from most
anglos' comprehension. Corridos, as the examples gathered in the
Heath Anthology
demonstrate (2:828-845), often focused on epic or
symbolic events.
Some of the great traditional corridos such as "Gregorio Cortez"
are still
well known in Mexican American communities. And despite a
relative decline,
corridos are still composed and circulated. For example, a
number of corridos
are already circulating to commmemorate the death of Cesar Chavez
this past
spring.
By 1900, Mexican American literature had emerged as a
distinctive part of the
literary culture of the United States. Its origins were Spanish
and Mexican,
its primary language Spanish and its religious sensibility
Catholic; in other
words, despite its growing particularity, it remained within the
orbit of
Latin American letters and oral tradition. Given their proximity
to Mexico--in border cities like El Paso, a matter of nothing more than the
width of the Rio Grande--Mexican Americans could maintain ties to the homeland
with relative ease and frequently traveled back and forth across the border,
invigorating
both cultures. Around the turn of the century, several major
develoments
ocurred. Eusebio Chacon published two novels in Santa Fe and a
few writers,
Maria Crístina Mena for example, began to publish stories in
English.
For the most part, Mexican American writing proceeded along
established lines
of develoment until 1945 when
Mexican Village, a remarkable novel
by Josephina
Niggli, appeared.
Mexican Village
was the first literary work by
a Mexican
American to reach a general American audience. Even more
important,
Mexican
Village
was clearly intended to convey to American readers the
distinctiveness
of Mexican American experience and expression. The protagonist
of the work is
Bob Webster, a Mexican American who settles in northern Mexico to
satisfy a
"nostalgia of the blood." Replete with references to Mexican
legends,
folktales and proverbs,
Mexican Village
is composed in English
that
nevertheless feels like Spanish; Niggle uses Spanish locutions in
English--
"the family Garcia," for example--and other times translates
Spanish phrases
literally into English. The overall result is a work of great
originality
that pointed the way to the hallmarks of the Chicano literary
sensibility.
World War II greatly accelerated the process of Mexican
American
acculturation. For one thing, the war stimulated the movement of
Mexican
Americans into large cities where military industries were badly
in need of
labor. And the high levels of Mexican American participation in
the military
significantly reduced cultural isolation. Not surprisingly,
Rudolfo Anaya's
Bless Me, Ultima,
perhaps the best-known of Chicano novels,
focuses on the
impact of World War II on a small community in New Mexico. Not
only is Las Pasturas rendered less isolated by the participation of its young
men in the
war itself, but the testing of the atomic bomb at nearby White
Sands
symbolizes how modern technology itself shrinks distances and
makes cultural
isolation, willful or not, all but impossible.
Like other forms of ethnic expression, Mexican American
literature received a
boost from the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Several
Chicano publishing
houses were created around this time, most notably Quinto Sol of
Berkeley.
Among the major writers nurtured by Quinto Sol were Rudolfo
Anaya, Rolando
Hinojosa-Smith and Tomás Rivera. In some ways Hinojosa-Smith and
Rivera had
much in common: they were both from South Texas; they had solid
academic
training in Spanish and Latin American literatures; they wrote
primarily in
Spanish; and they frequently wrote in estampas, sketches
sometimes only
several paragraphs in length.
Beyond these similarities, there are significant differences.
Hinojosa-Smith's work seems connected to the costumbrismo movement of
Latin America,
with its emphasis on the manners and oral traditions of a
particular region.
Rivera, on the other hand, seems more closely linked to the
compact, harshly
ironic narrative stance of the Mexican writer Juan Rulfo.
Although both
writers deemphasize the presence of the author and both avoid
moral
pronouncements, Hinojsa-Smith is playful and tolerant of--even
amused by--human frailty (See 2:1573-2582). Tomás Rivera, in an
extraordinary matching
of style and technique to subject matter, starkly depicts the
meager existence
of Chicano migrant workers, forcing his readers to confront the
inequalities
of the American economic system. Hinoja-Smith's characters are
often
boisterous, even larger than life; Rivera's are all but
invisible, toiling in
sun-baked fields, far removed from public attention and
compassion. (See
2:2752-2760).
Since the advent of Quinto Sol and, more recently, the
Bilingual Press and
Arte Público, Chicano literature has expanded impressively in all
directions.
Luìs Valdez, the founder of the Teatro Campesino, has had major
national
successes as a playwright and a filmmaker. The controversial
Richard
Rodriquez has attracted major reviews in the mainstream
press still a rare
experience for a Chicano writer for his two works of
autobiography.
No area of recent Chicano writing has yielded more satisfying
works than
poetry. José Montoya has been a major influence, notable for his
imaginative
bilingualism, his evocation of Chicano cultural values, and urban
experience.
Two of his poems, "La Jefita" and "El Louie" are among the most
admired of
recent Chicano verse.
Gary Soto is probably the best known of contemporary Chicano
poets. Soto
carries his ethnic consciousness visibly but lightly, and he
moves easily
across national boundaries, tracing lines of continuity between
Mexicans and
Chicanos. Like many of the finest Chicano writers, Soto shapes
his art out of
ordinary materials and experiences. His work is highly
autobiographical, and
it is a feature of some inportance that even as Soto delineates
his ethnic
pride, he also writes in English and tells of growing up in
Fresno playing
baseball. (See 2:3043-3049)
Among the more gratifying developments in Chicano writing
recently has been
the emergence of a strong group of women authors. By and large,
these writers
have been concerned to liberate the voices of women in
cultures--Mexican,
Mexican American, and American--that have not been traditionally
supportive.
They have sought to identify and root out practices of misogyny
in the
surrounding cultures--especially violence toward women--and they
have sought
to expand the feminist agenda to include women of color and
working-class
women. Among Chicana poets, Bernice Zamora and Lorna Dee
Cervantes have been
particularly powerful voices. In her collection, Restless
Serpents, Zamora
inveighs againt boundaries, created largely by men, that restrict
not only
action but emotion and sexuality. (See 2:2948-2951). In her
major collection
Emplumada, Lorna Dee Cervantes celebrates the Chicana's poetic
voice even as
she laments the continuing circumstances of male oppression and
complacency.
(See 2:3096-3103).
I would argue that the major task now before Chicana and
Chicano writers--and
for all American authors whose ethnic identities are central to
their work--is how to maintain their cultural distinctiveness while reaching
out to other
communities both to forge coalitions capable of addressing common
problems and
to reinvigorate their own traditions. Old varieties of cultural
nationalism
seem all but exhausted. Recently, Chicano intellectuals and
artists have been
discussing the concepts of "borders" and Mestizaje, the
phenomenon, so
fundamental to Mexico and Latin America, of mixing races and
cultures. It may
be that the reformulation of these concepts, esthetically and
thematically, is
the key to the future of Chicano expression and its place in
American culture.
(All page references are to the
Heath Anthology of American
Literature, Second
Edition.)