LITR 4333 American Minority Literature UHCL 2005 sample student answers to final exam

LITR 4332: American Minority Literature

Sample Student Final Exam Answers 2005

Research Report

Mexican American Literature

I chose to research Mexican American Literature because I wanted to find additional stories and authors that described my heritage. My starting point in the research was finding an author that would catch my attention. My research developed by reading Anglos and Mexicans In the Making of Texas, 1836-1986. This book gave me a better understanding of the beginning of Mexican American culture. It all began with the Mexican American War that lasted from 1846-1848 over unresolved border disputes between the Republic of Texas and Mexico. In 1848, with the Treaty of Hidalgo Mexico surrendered a huge area of land to the United States which included California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and part of Colorado (Beyond Books, 3f). Can you picture yourself becoming an immigrant without ever moving? The Mexicans had to chose whether to become citizens of the United States, or move back to Mexico. Only two thousand people left their homes, while eighty thousand remained, thus becoming, in the most literal sense of the term, Mexican Americans (TCU, 1081). Becoming citizens of the United States meant assimilating into the American culture. Moving back to Mexico meant a new start, but continuing with their culture. With these decisions came a mixture of ambivalent feelings. The end of this war was the beginning of Mexican American Literature. This report is going to describe a Mexican American author David Montejano, his writing style, themes in his works, and going to explain Mexican American Literature in result of the mixture of two cultures.

David Montejano received a B.A. from the University of Texas at Austin and two Masters and a Ph.D. from Yale University. Today, David Montejano is an Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. His major areas of study include Comparative and Historical Sociology, Political Sociology, Social Change, Race and Ethnic Relations, and Community Studies. Dr. Montejano is the author of an award-winning historical overview, Anglos and Mexicans In the Making of Texas, 1836-1986. I chose to research Dr. David Montejano, because his book was extremely useful in understanding the Mexican American War. He writes in a chronological order that does not leave out any detail. This book is a collection of secondary sources such as documents, maps, and charts, which help you understand the occurring changes in the history. Montejano’s writing style is very objective, unbiased and balanced. For example he states, “ The vestiges of a Mexican past are still evident. In the old cities of the region, the missions and governors’ palaces, the “old Mexicos,” the annual fiestas, and the like remind one that there is a history here, but it seems remote and irrelevant.” (Montejano, Intro). He wants to teach the reader about this land, in particular a 200-mile wide stretch paralleling the Mexican border from Brownsville to El Paso. Unlike the authors discussed in the course, Montejano’s writing style is emotionally disconnected and detached. He doesn’t seem to pick a side, but instead he writes about the two sides and the relationship between the two races. Montejano doesn’t write from experience, but from gathered information. He writes about the various people living in the regions disturbed by the war. In spite of his objective writing style, he captured themes that many Mexican Americans can relate to.

Themes in Montejano’s Anglos and Mexicans In the Making of Texas, 1836-1986 include the ambivalent minority and race relations. Objective 3c. Mexican American narrative: the ambivalent minority is about having mixed feelings or contradictory attitudes. The ambivalent feeling is the coexistence of opposing attitudes such as love and hate, happy and sad, staying and leaving. This ambivalent feeling is described in Bless Me, Ultima when Antonio says “for the first time I would be away from the protection of my mother. I was excited and sad about it” (Anaya, 51). In Montejano, the decision of staying in the United States or leaving back to Mexico displays this objective/theme best. Will the Mexican become a member of the minority group or will they become part of an immigrant culture? In the book Montejano says “ In the Texas-Mexican region, such a peace structure was characterized by two major aspects: one, the subordination of Mexicans to Anglos in matters of politics and authority; and two, the accommodation between new and old elites.” (Montejano, 34). In Montejano’s example the Mexicans assimilated into the minority group, because the Anglos were part of the dominant group. The minority group is smaller, has little power, and has less representation within a society. After reading Montejano and reading Bless Me, Ultima I found events in the books that matched up or explained the same ideas. For example when Antonio talks about his father and says “Even after the big rancheros and the tejanos came and fenced the beautiful llano, he and those like him continued to work there, I guess because only in that wide expanse of land and sky could they feel the freedom their spirits needed.”(Anaya, 2). Despite all of the tension between the Anglos and the Mexicans, the Mexicans continued to work hard and remain true to their heritage. As for the race relations theme Montejano uses race rather than ethnicity in his book. He tends to identify the biological and genetic differences such as major causes or inherited characteristics which one continues to follow. Montejano uses race to interpret the Mexicans and distinguishes that their main differences include language, culture, and attitudes. He states “the Mexican problem had nothing to do with integration or assimilation; rather, it was a question of locating another inferior race in American society.”(Montejano,181).

In this research report I was seeking information explaining Mexican American Literature in result of the mixture of two cultures. I found that Mexican American authors describe Objective 3.b this feeling of loss and survival. This feeling of loss and survival is displayed by an individual in the family usually an elder, experiencing a long journey, hard work, and sometimes failure. After this feeling of loss, the survival process is then established by a younger member of the family. This process tends to make everyone happy because the elder is happy to sacrifice their dream in order for another member of the family to succeed.

I chose Mexican American Literature to report on, because I could relate to the culture, way of life, and their mixture of feelings the author’s described. The characters were torn between assimilation, and being true to their heritage. The information gathered in the report included a different writing style, similar themes relating to the course, and an insight to the history of Mexican American Literature. In conclusion, Mexican-American Literature will continue to grow, due to the numbers of immigrants coming the United States each year. Each person will have a different story, a new experience, and be an important factor in American society and its literature.

Works Cited

Anaya, Rudolfo. Bless Me, Ultima. New York: Warner Books, 1972.

Beyond Books. Mexican-American Voices. Apex Learning Inc. Retrieved December 1,

2005, from http://beyondbooks.com/lam12/3f.asp.html

Montejano, David. Anglos and Mexicans: In the Making of Texas, 1836-1986. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1987.

Texas Christian University. Early Mexican-American Literature. Retrieved December 1, 2005, from http://www2.tcu.edu/depts/prs/amwest/pdf.html

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