continue Rudolfo
Anaya, Bless Me, Ultima
(pp. 50-176; chapters Seis through Catorce)
|
|
|
review border / ambivalence
recall Kat's presentation re choices, oppositions
main question overall for class re ambivalence: are Mexican Americans minorities or immigrants? (Must one choose?)
define ambivalence
51 first day of
schooling, years and years of schooling, away from the protection of my mother.
I was excited and sad about it.
Tony's parents?
Ultima's identity? 104 curandera x bruja
Farm x town (bridge)
58 tortillas x sandwiches
| immigrant | minority |
| assimilate | resist / remain separate |
| learn English | Spanish only |
| traditional extended family | nuclear family, individualism |
simple examples of ambivalence in Bless Me, Ultima
Toni's father expresses "ambivalence" whether he and his family was exploited by the new Anglo culture--does he want to resist or join it?
2 father a vaquero, even after big rancheros and tejanos came and fenced in the beautiful llano [memory of resentment at involuntary contact]
125 stories of the old days in Las Pasturas
sheepherders > cattle > horsemen > railroad and barbed wire
corridos, meeting of the people from Texas with my forefathers . . . uprooted, became migrants
3 After the war (World War 2), Mr. Marez wants to leave home and move to California [Sounds a lot like immigrant-dominant culture]
14 father’s dream: move westward + sons
resolutions? unification of ambivalent identity?
67 California or highway work. “Why does it have to be just those two choices?” move to Las Vegas, work there, rent
121 You have been seeing only parts . . . and not looking beyond into the great cycle that binds us all
12 seemed to dissolve into one strange, complete being
55 How could the blessing
of Ultima be like the whirlwind?
Was
the power of good and evil the same?
176 everyone should survive, but in new form
syncretism
Syncretism p. 79-81, 104
229 power, faith, reason + dark, mystical past
172 Vicks + herbs
42 She spoke of the ancient medicines of other tribes, the Aztecas, Mayas, and even of those in the old, old country, the Moors.
symbols
33 “you must never judge who God forgives and who He doesn’t”
167 bridge, dividing line b/w town (sin) and hills (quiet peace)
townspeople had killed Lupito at the bridge
Answers may not be either / or but both / and.
Answers may not be "either immigrant or minority" but some combination.
"Ambivalence" may be just a convenient term for some new cultural development, some new American identity.
What 3rd
options?
Mestizo
Bridge
style in Ultima > ambivalent
minority
Style: lyrical, dreamy + violent action (ambivalence?)
Dream: repetition of symbols, patterns
27 the three giants of my dreams
88 the Trementina sisters, Tenorio’s three girls
101 three dolls > three women > take life > stick pins
30 Had it been a dream? Or a dream within a dream?
60 [synesthesia]
61 my soul floated with the holiness of prayer into the sky of
dreams
99 waking dream
100 suffered spasms my uncle suffered, we dissolved into each
other
167 bridge, dividing line b/w town (sin) and hills (quiet
peace)
townspeople had killed Lupito at the bridge
243 three figures: Narciso, Lupito, Florence
243 The germ of creation lies in violence
247 Father: that way of life is just
about gone; it is a dream.
Perhaps it is time we gave up a few of our dreams. .
. gave up the old differences
92 saloon opposite church
metaphors:
borders (crossing and re-crossing)
bridge
Ambivalence as feeling crossed-up between old and new identities, not sure whether to advance or retreat.
Syncretism and symbols as possible techniques for bridging conflicts, fusing identities.
Literary expression of an underlying cultural difference: Mexico thinks of race differently than the USA. (next week)
Ambivalence and syncretism in Guadalupe story?
past student comments
painting on cloth that is combination of Indian and Spanish materials
historically, Virgin of Guadalupe may be connected to previous Indian fertility goddess
appearance of the Virgin combines European and Indian qualities
legend incorporates scriptural references
mestizo identity not identical with Indians; mestizo = mixed blood
Unlike the dominant immigrant culture, ethnic minorities did not choose to come to America or join its dominant culture.
immigrant: standard Anglo attitude is that Mexicans are immigrants, and it's true that the numbers of people moving from Mexico to the United States has increased exponentially in recent decades
minority: remember that most of the Southwestern United States--Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, and California--were part of Mexico until U.S.-Mexican War of 1846-48 -- Mexican-Americans suffered similar exploitation and dispossession as American Indians
Broad cultural questions posed by increasing Mexican American population in USA:
Will Mexican Americans assimilate and join dominant culture?
Will Mexican Americans remain a separate culture, emphasizing difference (plus or minus victimization)?
Will Mexican Americans speak Spanish, English, or some combination?
Will the traditional extended family endure, or will individualism and divorce rates increase?
Will Mexican Americans remain Catholic or become more Protestant (relevant to freemarket capitalism championed by US: see Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism)
Spanish x English
Catholic x folk traditions
White x brown
Modern x traditional
But not just lost souls caught between two worlds
"3rd
way"--people who are neither/nor but both
Modern x traditional
4 a curandera, a woman who knew the herbs and remedies of the ancients, a miracle-worker who could heal the sick
65 wasting their service money . . .
They did not hear their father.
67 California or highway work.
“Why does it have to be just those two choices?”
move to Las Vegas, work there, rent
68 dreams of their father and mother haunting them
72 curse laid on a disobedient son or daughter was irrevocable
72 cursed children were never heard from again
78 La Llorona
116 mermaid, deserted woman
120 Virgin of Guadalupe > mother!
187 Virgin and mother
187 Diego and Virgin of Guadalupe
187 I too would meet the Virgin; met Tenorio
displacement
2 father a vaquero, even after big rancheros and tejanos came
and fenced in the beautiful llano
3 effects of war, move to California [culture on move; cf.
Dominant culture]
14 father’s dream: move westward + sons
32 The war had taken my brothers away, and so the school would
take me away.
47 the church of my baptism!
49 El Puerto, a world where people were happy, working,
helping each other.
53 “The sons must leave the sides of their mothers”
58-59 I yearned for my mother, and at the same time I
understood that she had sent me to this place where I was an outcast.
59 not alone.
We banded together and in our union found strength.
66 “Mama would never move.
style in Ultima > ambivalent
minority
Style: lyrical, dreamy + violent action (ambivalence?)
Dream: repetition of symbols, patterns
27 the three giants of my dreams
88 the Trementina sisters, Tenorio’s three girls
101 three dolls > three women > take life > stick pins
30 Had it been a dream? Or a dream within a dream?
60 [synesthesia]
61 my soul floated with the holiness of prayer into the sky of
dreams
99 waking dream
100 suffered spasms my uncle suffered, we dissolved into each
other
167 bridge, dividing line b/w town (sin) and hills (quiet
peace)
townspeople had killed Lupito at the bridge
243 three figures: Narciso, Lupito, Florence
243 The germ of creation lies in violence
247 Father: that way of life is just
about gone; it is a dream.
Perhaps it is time we gave up a few of our dreams. .
. gave up the old differences
92 saloon opposite church
Siete
60 war over
60 [kinesthesia]
61 my soul floated with the holiness of prayer into the sky of
dreams
61 we who have traveled west until we were in the east, we are
coming home to you
63 The dream of moving west was revived
64 I was busy at school, driven by the desire to make mine the
magic of letters and numbers
65 wasting their service money . . .
They did not hear their father.
66 “It’s hell to have seen have the world then come back to
this.”
66 “It’s that Marez blood itching.”
66 “Mama would never move.”
67 speaking the truth.
The war had changed them.
Now they needed to lead their own lives.
67 California or highway work.
“Why does it have to be just those two choices?”
move to Las Vegas, work there, rent
67 “What about the folks?”
68 dreams of their father and mother haunting them
68 like I had done in the dream
Nueve
71 Oh, where is the innocence I must
never lose . . . .
[Ultima:] there in the land of the dancing plains
and rolling hills, there in the land which is the eagle’s by day and the owl’s
by night is innocence.
72 curse laid on a disobedient son or daughter was irrevocable
72 cursed children were never heard from again
72 The restlessness of his blood had destroyed his dream,
defeated him [father].
73 “the guy with an education gets ahead.”
73 “girls are only trouble.”
75 “Someday you will beat him, Tony.
Some day you will beat us all—“
75 That year we waited for the world to end.
76 And that year I learned to read and writer, magic in the
letters, still felt apart from them [class]
77 I started across the bridge, and it was the first time I
ever remember talking to it
78 gigantic railroad bridge, evil there
78 La Llorona
79-80
fishing for carp bad luck, why?
“I will tell you a story, a story that was told to
my father by Jason’s Indian—
when the earth was young and only wandering tribes .
. . a strange people came to this land.
They were sent to this valley by their gods. [Cf.
Genesis, Israelites]
They are part of
the people
81 If the golden carp was a god, who
was the man on the cross? The Virgin?
Was my mother praying to the wrong God?
Diez
83 my uncle had been bewitched, a bruja had put a curse on him
84 a prescribed ceremony
84-85 Why didn’t the priest fight against the evil of the
brujas?
85 “You must understand that when
anybody, bruja or curandera, priest or sinner, tampers with the fate of a man
that sometimes a chain of events is set into motion over which no one will have
ultimate control.
You must be willing to accept this responsibility.”
85 Juan was my middle name, but it was never used.
85 “She learned from the greatest healer of all time, the
flying man from Las Pasturas—“
86 not wise to mention the names of the witches without
warding off their evil with the sign of the holy cross
87 Under the old law there was no penalty for killing a witch.
88 the Trementina sisters, Tenorio’s three girls
89 “He is a
Juan.” Cf.
Virgin of Guadalupe, p. 475
90 a good sign; the moon was their goddess
91 [ritual]
“It is like the old days.”
91 “What will you need?”
“You know.”
92 saloon opposite church
93 sign of cross x-brujas; Ultima?
94 el hombre volador
94 “I must work the magic beyond evil, the magic that endures
forever—“
97 Would the magic of Ultima be stronger than all the powers
of the saints and the Holy Mother Church?
98 blue corn meal, Indians
98 “good is always stronger than evil.”
98-99 spend their time reading in the Black Book
99 waking dream
100 suffered spasms my uncle suffered, we dissolved into each
other
101 three dolls > three women > take life > stick pins
103 his hair with which they had worked evil
104 curandera x bruja . . . touched the hem of her dress
resolution of ambiguity > new
identity?
121 You have been seeing only parts . . . and not looking
beyond into the great cycle that binds us all
238 possible to have both?
Mestizo identity
481 face . . . somewhat dark + 53 I looked at my dark face in
the mirror
Hills x town > bridge
114 I could not have been more entranced if I had seen the
Virgin, or God Himself.
114 I knew I had witnessed a miraculous thing, the appearance
of a pagan god, a thing as miraculous as the curing of my uncle Lucas. . . . if
God was witness to my beholding of the golden carp then I had sinned.
124 scapular: icon or herbs
173 forgive Narciso, forgive Tenorio
176 everyone should
survive, but in new form
247 reform the old
materials, make something new
247 can a new religion be made?
247 first priest: father of Lunas?
248 the priest had changed, so perhaps his religion could be
made to change
260 not dead > new place, new time
260 With the passing away of Tenorio and myself the meddling
will be done with, harmony will be reconstituted.
displacement
2 father a vaquero, even after big rancheros and tejanos came
and fenced in the beautiful llano
3 effects of war, move to California [culture on move; cf.
Dominant culture]
14 father’s dream: move westward + sons
32 The war had taken my brothers away, and so the school would
take me away.
47 the church of my baptism!
49 El Puerto, a world where people were happy, working,
helping each other.
53 “The sons must leave the sides of their mothers”
58-59 I yearned for my mother, and at the same time I
understood that she had sent me to this place where I was an outcast.
59 not alone.
We banded together and in our union found strength.
66 “Mama would never move.”
Once
106 I could not understand how the
power of God could fail.
But it had. . . . “Do you believe the golden carp is
a god?”
108 the garden of Narciso . . . bewildered
109 “The magic people all know about the coming day of the
golden carp.”
109 It seemed that the more I knew about people the more I
knew about the strange magic in their hearts.
111 “You’re a Protestant.
You don’t know about the brujas.”
111 “people, grown-ups and kids, seem to want to hurt each
other—and it’s worse when they’re in a group.”
113 “the real king is the golden carp,
Tony.
He does not eat his own kind—“
113 It was bigger than me!
114 I could not have been more entranced if I had seen the
Virgin, or God Himself.
114 I knew I had witnessed a miraculous thing, the appearance
of a pagan god, a thing as miraculous as the curing of my uncle Lucas. . . . if
God was witness to my beholding of the golden carp then I had sinned.
115 strange
brotherhood, secret would always bind us; the
presence
116 mermaid, deserted woman
117 whole land once covered by a sea
118 collapse and be swallowed by the water
118 “all men sin”
119 “sin against no
one”
119 the beauty had burdened me with responsibility
120 Virgin of Guadalupe > mother!
121 You have been seeing only parts . . . and not looking
beyond into the great cycle that binds us all
Doce
123 Ultima told me the stories and legends of my ancestors . .
. the glory and the tragedy of the history of my people . . . how that history
stirred in my blood
124 scapular: icon or herbs
125 stories of the old
days in Las Pasturas
sheepherders > cattle >
horsemen > railroad and barbed wire
corridos, meeting of
the people from Texas with my forefathers . . . uprooted, became migrants
125-26 their tragedy, their search for the freedom that was
now forever gone
128 Tenorio has blamed la Grande for his daughter’s death
129 he was on his land and as such would not be shamed in
front of his son.
130 let no man invade his home
130 “she is of no relation to you”
132-33 law by custom
134-35 walked through
door, broken or fallen, would never know
Trece
137 [forgiveness] Perhaps the best god would be like a woman.
137 village is small. . . we have not passed judgment on
anyone
138 uncle Mateo, the story teller
140 dream: black mass, Ultima!
Catorce
143 all changed, smaller
150 Samuel: “It will only end when blood is spilled.”
152 the kids from Los Jaros couldn’t read
163 something held me at the gate of the evil women
165 Had I already lost my innocence?
How had I sinned?
I only wanted to be home . . . I only felt tired,
and older.
167 I had seen evil, and so I carried the evil within me . . .
I had somehow lost my innocence and let sin enter my soul
167 bridge, dividing line b/w town (sin) and hills (quiet
peace)
townspeople had killed Lupito at the bridge
168 perhaps the llano was like me, as I grew the innocence was
gone, and so too the land changed.
170 not fair that Narciso die for doing good
172 Vicks + herbs
172 I simply had to tell my story to purge the fever
173 forgive Narciso,
forgive Tenorio
176 everyone should
survive, but in new form