Week 2 Blog Response

Hi, all, this is Haleh Mawson.

 One thing that struck me throughout all these descriptions of the midcentury Chicano rights movement was its introspection. Its goal, it seems, was not merely to change the dominant Anglo culture around it, but to define or change Chicano culture as well. It was something that only occurred to me rather late in the readings, although the idea of discovering something new was present in each story of a political awakening. I didn't realize until Blackwell began describing "the politics of memory" that these individual experiences, writings, and songs were not merely individual, but parts of the continuous act of cultural creation. Interwoven with the pursuit of racial justice was the desire for self-definition, for renaming/restoring the Southwest to Aztlan, for deciding their language of debate, for creating a community that shared common values and backgrounds. It didn't exist in the same way before, it seems - Alice Bag talks about her father not liking the term Chicano (1). Yet there is a long history there too, a history in part created by the movement itself. That is not to disparage those thinkers. They did not rewrite history. They recreated it through art.

I think that's the most interesting thing about this. Art (by which I mean all art, journalism and pamphleteering included) was what created the ideas which these individuals fought for. When male activists tried to exclude chicanas and create a "traditional" culture predicated on machismo, women objected and substituted their own. As Blackwell says, "identities are not fixed in the past" (95). Cultures are not static, and can be viewed different ways by different people. Art serves both to create those views, and to allow one person to see new perspectives. It's usually a sort of overview through details. Alice Bag's video, which was the last thing I looked at, communicates the both the sensation of being at the march ("Agua fresca, corn tortillas," 0:56s) and the overarching idea ("White justice is a travesty," 1:49). She's not merely retelling an event, she's recreating it, and imbuing it with her own beliefs and values.