Latest / Tales From Aztlantis / Throwback Thursday: Dia De Los Muertos, The Chicano Connection!

Transcript

Throwback Thursday: Dia De Los Muertos, The Chicano Connection! · Tales From Aztlantis

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: This episode of Tales from Ostlanthus is brought to you by Ostlantis Premium.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: Don't you just hate having your favorite podcast interrupted by ads like this?
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well, dear listener, you're in luck.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: Because starting at just three bucks a month, you can support independent Chicano Media and receive ad-free episodes, premium episodes, bonus content, and access to our Discord server.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: Just visit talesfromastlantis.com and click Go Premium or follow the link in the show notes.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: And now, on with the show.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: You must excuse me.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: I've grown quite a man.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: This hasn't been easy in the number.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: But you've learned a lesson.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: A lesson in honesty.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Honesty to your stomach, and honesty to others.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think we've learned a good lesson.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: I've always heard that honesty is the best honesty.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'm catching up, summoning, why that's summoning, why that's summoning, why that's.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: Greetings, dear listeners, and welcome to yet another episode of Tales from Ostlantis.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: We are your hosts, Curly Tlapoyawa.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: And Ruben Ariano Tlacatekat.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: So uh how are you doing, man?
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Things good?
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, things things are good.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: Did you get a lot of trick-or-treaters last night?
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_02: Well, we actually went trick-or-treating.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, nice.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yoli, uh, my daughter was like, she dressed up for Halloween as some, I don't know, some character, some manga character or something.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: And um, she's like, I feel like trick-or-treating because all my friends are doing.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, alright, I guess we'll guess we're going trick-or-treating.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_02: Cool.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_02: But since most of the the the kids in my neighborhood, like, they go somewhere else to trick-or-treat, so that's what we ended up doing too.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we're the neighborhood that all the kids come to for trick-or-treating.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: So pretty uh I think we started off with like a thousand pieces of candy, and we have one bag of a hundred left.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: So we get we get nailed pretty hard in this neighborhood.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: We tell all of our nieces and nephews, like, come come to our neighborhood, because they give out the bomb candy.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_02: That's kind of the way it was where we went.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_02: That's like people here in the neighborhood, they know that that's those streets over there, that's where they have the good stuff.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_02: And they go all out decorating their homes, and I mean it's a big, big production.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Very cool.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: So today, on our final episode, the season finale, season two.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's pretty exciting.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: Two seasons.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: Two seasons.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_02: Wow.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when you know when we started this, I had no idea how far we were gonna take it, and here we are.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, finishing up season two.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, with like so we so we have like what 20 regular episodes for each season.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_02: So this is 40 just regular episodes.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: This is not including the premium episodes and the dispatches and yeah, the little one-offs or special episodes.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_02: So, wow, that's that's pretty uh I mean, I don't know how we do it.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_02: Where do we find the time?
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, I want to take this opportunity to say thank you to all of our listeners who've kept us going for two seasons.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: We will be back for for a third season.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: We've already got topics brewing in our brains and scripts being written as we speak.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: And potential guests as well.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, very exciting stuff.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: So today, we're going to be talking about the Chicano Days of the Dead.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: Before we begin this episode, it's necessary to do two things.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: First, I want to give credit up front to my main source for this second part of our two Day of the Dead episodes for season two.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_02: The bulk of the information for this episode is derived from Regina Marchi, who is an assistant professor of media studies and an affiliated professor of Latino Studies at Rutgers University.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_02: She has conducted extensive research on the holiday as it is observed in the United States and published a book entitled Day of the Dead in the USA: The Migration and Transformation of a Cultural Phenomenon in 2009.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_02: The book was recently reissued this year, 2022, and I encourage everyone who wants to get the deeper story to go out and get it.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: It's a really good book.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_02: So I first encountered Marchi's work on the Dia de los Muertos through her articles on the topic.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_02: The first is entitled Chicano Art as Alternative Media, its influence on US Popular Culture and Beyond, published in the International Journal of the Arts in Society in 2010.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_02: And the second one is called Hybridity and Authenticity in U.S.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: Day of the Dead Celebrations, published in the Journal of American Folklore in 2013.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_02: Her work confirmed a suspicion I'd had for many years about the origin of the Dia de los Muertos as we understand it today.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_02: The holiday owes its contemporary popularity and resurgence to the work of Chicano activists in the 1970s.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: This was also my suspicion for the Cinco de Mayo celebration, which was confirmed by the outstanding work of David E.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_02: Hayes Bautista, El Cinco de Mayo and American Tradition, published in 2012.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_02: I wrote a piece about Cinco de Mayo for the Washington Post earlier this year, which was based on an older paper that we had used for an episode on the subject back in episode 7, Happy Cinco de Mayo from season 1, and we reposted it earlier this year as episode 30, 5 de mayo, for our current season 2.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_02: You should go back and listen to those episodes to get an understanding about this double argument that I'm trying to connect here with Dia dos Muertos and 5 de mayo.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_02: Now, the second thing that I'd like to do for the benefit of our listeners who might not know much about it is to briefly explain what is meant by the Chicano movement.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_02: The Chicano movement arose in the mid-1960s and lasted roughly throughout the 1970s.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_02: The movement was defined by three main overall objectives: the struggle for better economic opportunities, more political representation, demands for adequate educational opportunities, and also a fourth and very important objective, that of affirming their indigeneity as Native people to the Americas to the Southwest.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: The recently deceased Chicano scholar Armando Navarro, may he rest in peace, described this generation of Mexican-American activism as quote, relentless and resolute in its pursuit to extricate Mexicanos from the shackles of poverty, marginalization, and powerlessness.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: End quote.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_02: And in case you are wondering what is indigeneity, indigeneity simply means Indian identity.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: Now, the movement was like the black power and red power phases of the African American and American Indian causes, respectively.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_02: It was common to hear chants of brown power coming from Chicanos during political rallies and marches, and emblazoned on shirts, posters, and buttons.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: For the person who is completely new to the subject and doesn't want to read literature full of academic jargon and who does, I recommend Mecio Montoya's book, Chicano Movement for Beginners, published in 2016.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_02: That's an awesome book.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: I have I have a few quibbles with some of the things, but overall it's a very good uh starting point.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like one of those little for beginners books.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if people are familiar with them, but they're Dunny's comics, so they're very easy.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_02: His inspiration was Rios, uh, who was the originator of those.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, having a little background in the subject will help make sense of Marti's arguments that we're doing here, that we're promoting here.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_02: That Chicano artists introduced the Dio de los Muertos Holiday to the US, and that they chicanified or that the chicanophied version of the holiday influenced the resurgence of the indigenous tradition outside of its cultural homeland of southern Mexico.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, Chicanos were gonna do that because they were reconnecting and reaffirming their indigenous identity.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: So, Ya de Muertos and the Chicano Connection.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: I love the Chicano Connection.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_02: Sounds like the Chicano movie.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: There is some Bruce Lee in there.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: Let's begin with Marchie's first article, Chicano Art as Alternative Media, where she discusses the Chicano movement's goals and tells us that Chicanos wanted to combat historically negative stereotypes of Mexican Americans in the US mass media and create their own alternative media in the form of public art through arte contestatario, art designed to challenge mainstream racist tropes.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: Political transformation through collective efforts and spiritually influenced artistic expression became major themes of the Chicano movement.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_02: This was a period in which people of color in the US were reclaiming their cultural roots, such as language, clothing, art, music, rituals, and other ancestral traditions that had been lost to enslavement, colonization, reservation systems, and assimilation.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_02: For communities unaccustomed to seeing positive images, the mass media, the significance of publicly honoring collective experiences and cultural traditions was transformative and empowering.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_02: Historically, US news coverage depicted Mexicans and other so-called Latinos as lazy, less intelligent, less moral, and prone to crime.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: Also known as my hood.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: This pattern of negative representation existed in magazine, television advertising, and Hollywood films.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: Ethnic Mexicans were stereotyped as bandidos, gangbangers, Latin lovers, dangerous temptresses, or dim-witted buffoons.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_02: Newspaper coverage reinforced the negative stereotypes found in the social disadvantaged framework, which depicted neighborhoods as cesspools of crime.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: The residents of those barrios were shown as lacking basic education, limited employment skills, and were often presented as illegitimate non-citizens.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: Marchi continues her examination of this period in the media and arts and correctly assesses that public admiration of Chicano culture was rare, and when it was acknowledged, it was almost always through a Spanish lens and not an indigenous one.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I think we've done plenty of episodes covering that idea, that trope.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_02: Eurocentrism or Eurocentric racism categorized Indian ancestry and heritage as shameful, and anyone who displayed a sympathy to the culture was consigned to inferior socioeconomic status vis-a-vis that of Anglos.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: It was in the face of this antipathy that, as a rejection of this mentality, which had colonized the minds of many Mexican Americans and the larger Anglo-American society over decades, Day of the Dead celebrations and other actions emerging from the Chicano movement emphatically commemorated the customs and beliefs of a working-class mestizo and indigenous Mexican.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: Marchi explains further that before the 1970s, most Mexican Americans observed November 1st and 2nd, similarly to other Catholics around the world, as All Saints Day and All Souls Day.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: They attended Mass, placed flowers by the gravesites of departed loved ones, and prepared meals for family gatherings.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: Indigenous traditions such as sugar skulls, pan de muerto, and the elaborate altar-making traditions of southern Mexico were relatively unknown.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: When Chicanos began to reconnect with their cultural roots, they brought these ways back with them to barrios across the southwest.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_02: Cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Antonio, and I would guess Albuquerque as well.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe we can talk about that afterwards.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: So cities and barriers across the southwest started to incorporate and showcase the this important celebration and decorations through altar installations in art galleries, community centers, and schools.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: Eventually the aesthetic would come to adorn major museums, and the holiday would inspire the organization of large-scale parades, as we had one here recently in Dallas.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_02: This is like the third year that we have one.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: As observed by Marci, Day of the Dead sugar skulls quickly became a ubiquitous expression of Chigano iconography because of their perceived connection to Aztic culture and their attention-grabbing nature.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_02: She cites Chigano artist and educator Yolanda Garfield's Wu, an early proponent of Day of the Dead celebrations in California's public schools, who noted that compared with most US holidays, Day of the Dead was so far out.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: It was a shocking kind of thing to be doing.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: It literally shocked the non-Latino community.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: And that's exactly the emphasis that Chicanos were looking for.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: They wanted to make a statement and make it big.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: Have you picked up your Mexica calendar for the year 12 Flint?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: Or how about a paperback copy of the four disagreements?
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: Just visit talesfromacidlantis.com for all the latest merchandise and show some love for your favorite podcast.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's TalesFromAcidlantis.com for all the latest merchandise.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Now, back to the show.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_02: An innovative component of Chigano Day of the Dead celebrations was the inclusion of Danza Azteca.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_02: Danzantes frequently inaugurate Day of the Dead processions and parades, and they also bless altar exhibitions and community celebrations.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Nonetheless, even though Danza was previously not done on Day of the Dead festivities in Mexico, Marchi states that by combining Aztec ceremonial dancing with the ofrenda tradition in ways that were not done by the indigenous populations of Mexico, Chicanos exercised creative syncretism.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: They also exercised syncretism by mixing the personal with the political.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: Besides honoring deceased family and friends, Chicanos converted the holiday into a commemoration of the collective ancestors, creating public altars for beloved actors, singers, writers, artists, revolutionaries, and other popular culture icons as a way to educate the public.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one of the things that I really love about it, by the way.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_02: I know, right?
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_02: Marci further adds that Chicanos used the holidays' focus on remembrance to criticize dominant power structures by creating altar installations intended to raise public awareness of socio-political causes.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_02: This act expanded a tradition originally meant for relatives into one that incorporated people outside of their family group.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_02: Traditionally, Chicano altar installations have commemorated farm workers poisoned by pesticides, migrants who died trying to cross the US-Mexico border, urban youth victimized by gangs and drugs, factory workers killed in industrial accidents, and victims of U.S.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_02: funded wars such as those in Chile, Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Vietnam, and other current armed conflicts.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: In keeping with the activists' vision of Chicano art, altar installations also bring attention to the death of the environment.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_02: And in today's political climate, salient issues like women's reproductive health are also themes that continue to push those boundaries between culture, tradition, and action.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_02: At the community college where I teach, students set up an altar honoring the dead elementary school children and their teachers who were brutally murdered by gunmen in Noval de Tejas earlier this year.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_02: May they rest in peace.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_02: Without even realizing it, these young people are continuing in the Chicano tradition of arte contestatario.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: Marchi's research shows that this tradition has a precise date of origin.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_02: The first recorded Day of the Dead activities conducted in an art gallery space in the U.S.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: occurred in 1971.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: That year, two Chicano art spaces, Self-Help Graphics in Los Angeles and Galeria de la Raza in San Francisco, organized separate celebrations of the holiday independently of each other.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: Shoutouts to Self-Help Graphics and La Galleria de la Rasa.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: I know, and they're still around both of those spaces.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: Dope.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_02: Self-Help Graphics, a community-based visual arts center in the predominantly Chicano community of East Los Angeles, hosted a spirited Day of the Dead procession in which people dressed up as skeletons and walked to a nearby cemetery.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_02: As Marti explains, none of the Chicanos who helped organize this initial ceremony were personally familiar with Day of the Dead, but learned about it from the three founders of Self-Help Graphics.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: The founders were the Mexican-born artists Antonio Ibañez and Carlos Bueno, and the Italian-American nun, Sister Karen Bocalero.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: Or is it Bocalero?
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: Through the influence of Ibañez and Bueno, the self-help graphics artists were introduced to the imagery of calaveras or skulls and indigenous style altar makers.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't long before the celebration gained attraction within the larger Chicano artist community, and in a few short years the altars grew and the celebration attracted more participation that now included an array of activities and materials, including silk screen prints, posters, paintings, t-shirts, multimedia compositions, performances, and countless Day of the Dead inspired expressions.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: The Day of the Dead procession at Self-Help eventually became an annual event.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_02: The festivities concluded in Self-Help's gallery where a Day of the Dead art show was held.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_02: There were also workshops in sugar skull making and related crafts, as well as performances by the Chicano political theater troupe El Teatro Campesino.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: The celebrations continued to evolve, and as Marchi describes, in time, the Los Angeles Day of the Dead procession grew to include music, Aztec danza, giant skeleton puppets, sculptures, banners, stylized Chicano lowrider cars, decorated floats, and more.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: Because Self-Help Graphics worked with local elementary schools to educate students and teachers about Day of the Dead, hundreds of children attended the processions, displaying celebratory art projects made in school.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's pat ass.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: Workshops teaching the public how to make papel picado, sugar skulls, plastic skeleton masks, and altars would be an important part of the organization's Day of the Dead festivals for decades to come.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: As the celebration grew, it inspired the community around it, and before long, community centers, schools, libraries, art galleries, museums, folk art stores, city parks, and commercial districts throughout Southern California also came to develop their own annual Day of the Dead programming.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: But LA wasn't the only place engaged in the construction and Adaptation of this imported tradition.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_02: Artists in San Francisco were also developing their own vision of the holiday in that same year of 1972.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_02: And here I think I misspoke earlier.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_02: I meant to say 72, not 71.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_02: So this is this is all happening in the year of 1972.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_02: The Chicano Art Gallery, La Galería de la Raza, is located in the heart of San Francisco's Mission District.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_02: It held the city's first Day of the Dead altar exhibition, which was organized by artists René Yañez and Ralph Maradiaga, Carmen Lomas Garza, and Yolanda Garfias Wu.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: Their exhibition and related educational activities also evolved into an annual tradition as had occurred with self-help's activities in Los Angeles.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_02: By 1981, La Galeria organized a small Day of the Dead procession comprised of a small group of about 25 people who walked around the block holding candles and photos of deceased loved ones.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_02: The annual procession eventually burgeoned into a manifestation of thousands of residents from the surrounding communities.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_02: The participants also came to include Danza Azteca, brightly colored banners, street side altar installations, sidewalk chalk art, giant calavera puppets, portable sculptures, and many other curiosities.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_02: The themes and people who were commemorated reflected a broad spectrum between the traditional and the contemporary.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: In some instances, people walked in honor of deceased family members, others walked to draw attention to the socio-political causes involving death and community suffering, such as US military interventions abroad, gun violence, and as well as that of the culturally and politically charged health issue of the 1980s and 1990s, AIDS.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: Altar installations honored regional Mexican altar-making traditions, feminist ofrendas, and tributes to artists.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_02: Hence, the importance that the Galeria de la Raza had on the development and evolution of the holiday cannot be overstated.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_02: The gallery was small, but it had a profound influence on the shape of the Day of the Dead celebrations in the United States.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: One of its main contributions was encouraging hybrid experimentation and mainstreaming the alter format.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: Citing Chicana curator Teredromo, Marchi notes that the Galeria's most significant contribution to El Dia de los Muertos and to Chicano art history was the new direction in which it took ofrendas.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: By blending traditional rituals with modern materials and designs, artist René Yanyez transformed the altar format into an environmental space and pushed altar making into the realm of contemporary art while still remaining respectful of the traditional ofrenda as the source of inspiration.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's profound.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_02: The exhibit experimentation conducted at La Galleria ultimately generated citywide recognition and inspired parallel celebrations elsewhere.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: The overarching point that Marchie makes here is that because of the activities of these two art galleries, La Galleria de la Raza and Self-Help Graphics, museums, schools, and cities throughout the United States now organize Day of the Dead programming in October and November.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_02: The other point that merits repeating here is that the holiday we have come to know and love in the US as Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead would not be the same or even exist on the level it does today, were it not for the efforts of Chicana Chicano Chicanex artists in embracing their indigenity.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_02: That is key and foremost and upfront in this entire discussion.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_02: Centering and asserting Indianness, after all, was the point of proudly proclaiming a Chicano identity.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_02: Chicano influence on Mexico.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_02: The second main point Marchi makes is one I'm sure will cause some discomfort and even denial by Mexican cultural purists.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_02: Because how can it be that Chicanos have influenced Mexican culture in any significant way?
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_02: A basic understanding of Marchi's work will lead anyone to the following conclusion that while Chicano artists were initially inspired by Mexican Day of the Dead rituals, those expressions were later influenced by Chicano renderings of the holiday.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: This happened as Mexican artists and tourists visited the US and observed Chicano Day of the Dead installations.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: It also happened as Chicano artists traveled to Mexico City to give workshops and promote books they had written about the celebration.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_02: However, before Chicanos embraced the holiday, revitalized it, and imported it back to Mexico's urban centers, indigenous peoples were ridiculed by non-Indigenous Mexicans for creating Day of the Dead altars and making ofrendas.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: Ironically, while Chicanos were discovering and popularizing El Día de los Muertos in the United States, many middle-class Mexicans dismissed the tradition as something that only rural, uneducated, and superstitious Indians celebrated.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: Urban elites who wanted to forge a modern or westernized Mexico considered Day of the Dead a mortifying anachronism, best left behind.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_02: Mortifying driving homeism.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_02: It was the appreciation that Chicano teachers, professors, and artists had for the holiday which helped elevate it in the eyes of urban Mexicans.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_02: This sentiment was particularly true among Mexican artists.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_02: Marti cites Amalia Mesa Baines, a visual arts professor at California State University Monterey Bay, who states A number of Chicanos began to look to go back to Mexico and assist in reclaiming the tradition there.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: In Mexico City and other large cities where there was much more dominance from the US, most contemporary Mexican artists were not interested in these traditions because to them they seemed rather old-fashioned.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so, we Chicano artists actually valued something that contemporary Mexican artists did not.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody's not gonna like that.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_02: Right?
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_02: This observation is not unidirectional.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: For Mexican artists themselves have noted the influence of Chicano Day of the Dead celebrations on Mexico.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_02: For instance, the Mexican sculptor Guillermo Pulido observed that there was a regeneration and transformation taking place with the Day of the Dead in the USA and felt that there was a quote recycling of influences back and forth, end quote, between the countries.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_02: When he moved to California as an adult in 1997, he was surprised to see how Day of the Dead was celebrated in the United States.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: This, he felt, was due to the political nature of the Chicano celebrations, which had now inspired more politicized and artistic experimentation with altars in Mexico.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_02: This observation was confirmed not only by the casual observer, but the curator Terre Romo, who noted that Chicano Day of the Dead celebrations offered new models and inspiration for future generations of artists as well.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_02: Romo further explained that the process of incorporation and revitalization began 50 years ago by Chicano artists and that who had quote forever changed the tradition not only in the United States but in Mexico as well.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_02: And so, in conclusion, there is no doubt that the Chicano community played an important role in helping evolve, revitalize, and popularize the Día de los Muertos tradition.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_02: It is also true that, as it happened with the 5 de mayo celebrations, the holiday is defined through an exclusively Mexican-centric lens.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_02: But whether you accept it or deny it, the fact remains that Chicano artists established the tradition in the US and made it cool for Mexicans who don't have an indigenous view of themselves to celebrate it as well.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_02: Chicanos made the holiday their own, repackaged it, and gifted it back to Mexico and the world.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_02: But because it was done by Chicanos, that group of people caught in Nepantla, that in-between space, there won't be any public acknowledgement commemorating that.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_02: Therefore, in this final regular episode of season two, we hear your co-hosts of Telos from Aslantes, Curly Tlapoyao and myself, we send a huge thank you to Regina Marchi for the wonderful work she's done in bringing attention to this topic.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_02: And finally, we would be remiss if we didn't acknowledge the ongoing efforts in the Chicano community in keeping our culture alive and vibrant.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: Man, that was good.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: I've been wanting I've been wanting to do this episode for a while now.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_02: I know, I know.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_02: I think we talked about doing this last year, we just didn't get around to it.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_02: Because I've been I've been reading her stuff for a couple of years now, and I'm like, we need to do something about this, but the time just wasn't right, I guess.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, and it's you know, good timing right now.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_02: Because 50 years.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, think about it.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's been fifty, and look at how far the tradition has come.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: Speaking of which, you know, going back to to this idea that that that before the deal los muertos, the day of the day, the way that we celebrate it today with the sure skulls and the indigenous uh uh altars and ofrendas.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, personally speaking, you know, I was born in the 70s, and in the 80s, I don't recall a lot of Dia de los Muertos activity taking place here in Dallas.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't until maybe the nineties when I started noticing stuff, or maybe that's when I started paying attention.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_02: But for sure, like the early nineties, like with the with the whole, you know, um resurgence of Chicano activism in the early nineties and response to the 500 uh the quincentenary of Columbus and and and those things that were going on.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_02: I think that that's when here in Dallas we began to see a little bit more of that, because that's when dancer really also begins to take off here in Dallas as well, is in in the early 90s.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's when I first started seeing you know, not all Saints Day and All Souls Day, because that was already happening, right?
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_02: But like Día de los Muertos as we know it with the with the indigenous uh tradition uh associated with it.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: So I don't know what it was like for you in New Mexico or or what do you remember growing up?
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: Kind of the same thing because I started doing danza in 1993, basically as a result of the 500, you know, commemorations and stuff.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: There were all of these protests, and that's where I really first saw um a danza grupo, which is the grupo that I'm still a a member of.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Calpulia Hekat shout out here in uh yeah, shout out.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that's when I yeah, the same thing, when I started noticing, right?
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: Taking note of like, oh wow, because the the captain of our grupo is an artist, and that year, 1993, there was an exhibition here at the uh South Broadway Cultural Center of the A de Muertos, and he had something there.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: So when I went to that, that was the first time I saw it, like, oh wow, shit, this is this is badass.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it was politicized.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: I did notice that there was all that, you know, the anti-Columba stuff, there was stuff for farm workers, there was uh, you know, people who were uh dying on the border, like all of them were represented on these altars.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: I remember that very specifically.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then we had a group here, they were called the um the Raramuri Center, and they held the first like big Día de los Muertos event in Albuquerque.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_01: Nice, and I was there, it was it was it was awesome.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_01: And um, in fact, I just had dinner with the founders not a few weeks ago.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_01: What?
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_01: And um, yeah, yeah, it was it was cool to see them again.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_01: And um I remember we went there and it was very small at first, right?
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um it was at their at their space, but then through time it really started growing, and then it became the uh the muertos parade, and then the marigold parade, it was called, and it really started growing and growing, and it was held in the South Valley in Albuquerque, and the whole community would come out, and it was packed.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody would make uh uh floats and and show up, you know, paint it up, and there would be music and art, and it was just a really cool event.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh Rusita Ávila, shout out Rusita, she's like a powerhouse here in Albuquerque.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_01: We went to college together.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_01: She took over basically as like the main organizer of the parade, and she did it for a very, very long time, and unfortunately, um, you know, weird turn of events, we haven't had it.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, there was the pandemic, but even before the pandemic, we stopped holding the parade because uh, you know, the wokoso's I there's no other word for it in my mind.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: They they got involved and they were like, look, there's too many white people showing up like this and we can't have them showing, and I'm like, are you out of your goddamn mind?
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so that became a sticking point, right?
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like people are coming from they're not even from the cell phone.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_02: The whole point of the original ultra exhibitions is to expose us to the wider world.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that was right, normalize our culture, not stop othering us, you know, like help you understand who we are.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, let's let's not make this uh an episode about about the Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: But that's just you know something that happened.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's something that happened, it was unfortunate.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: But um, you know, during the pandemic, um my wife and I, together with Kalpulia Hecat, um put together a uh we called it the Burket La Manali.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so we have Civic Plaza here in town, and we were like, since we can't have events because of the pandemic, um we'll just make like a public la manale, a public like this.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_02: Was this last year or the year before?
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_02: Because I remember the it was yeah, it was the year before.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I do remember.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_01: First year posted on that.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, uh Paz, the uh from Kalpulia Hecat, he's a great artist.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_01: He created this beautiful uh design for for the uh the altar for the Tlamanali, and we went, we set it all up, and just basically invited the public.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like, hey, you want to show up and leave?
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know, people brought photographs, people brought food, people brought drinks, and just you know, it was out in the open, and you could show up, leave your stuff, have have a moment, and then you would leave, and by the end of it, it was it was big, it was nice, it was something really beautiful that I'm I'm really proud to have been a part of.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_02: Awesome.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_02: So so what I'm hearing from you is that that at least in Albuquerque there's been uh Dial de los Muertos parade for many years now, going is it going back to the 90s?
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_02: Is that what early 90s?
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, at least 93, 94.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_02: And and you know, it's interesting because you know I've visited New Mexico, you know, many times.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and especially when you're like in Santa Fe and you go to like the you know, is it the historic center of Santa Fe and all those little shops that they have there, and like you see a lot of sugar skulls like all the time, no matter what time of the year it is, it could be you know at the heat of summer, and there's sugar skulls and and all this, and it's all like very reminiscent of Day of the Dead, and I'm thinking, wow, I mean, think about that.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_02: And and by this point, I'm um, you know, I I already know the history of Day of the Dead and where it comes from and how it be you know got popular here in the United States.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm thinking, how how far back does this tradition here in Santa Fe go with these local artists creating all this Day of the Dead sort of uh adjacent, you know, uh Artesania artwork, you know, that they sell at their shops.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: Like, when did that get going?
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_02: How how did that tradition come about in Santa Fe?
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, honestly, I don't know.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because I don't go to Santa Fe, but um at least I it wasn't pre-90s for sure.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um but definitely when the Los Muertos started becoming more mainstream, I think, you know, the artists up in Santa Fe saw that as an opportunity to so maybe 20 years at this point, more or less.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_02: I would say so.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, at least.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um one of the the current things that we do here in Albuquerque is there's a small group of cyclists, and they they hold an annual event called Day of the Tread.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: And they all get together and they do it's almost like that um critical mass type of thing where they all get together and but it's all Dia de Muertos themed.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_01: And they do it on a day, like today, for instance, or I think they did it last weekend.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's around the the time.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: The time, yeah.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, everything is so um crazy right now because of the pandemic.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_01: I think people are just trying to to get in where they can.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you know it's holding the year in Dallas, like the the major deal los muertos parade didn't start until um twenty nineteen.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_02: That we had our first one.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_02: And uh of the you know, our Arvansa um group is the one that's been um sort at sort of at at you know at the head of that parade for you know in twenty nineteen, and then we had to stop because of the pandemic, and then we picked it up again, I believe, last year, and then this year.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_02: So it's the third annual um Day of the Dead parade that just uh this occurred this this past weekend, and are you know, are lots of groups of one that's been sort of leading the the parade, as in most parades, you know, like that's that's something that I've noticed, like Cinco de Mayo or Day of the Dead, whenever it's something that is involving uh Mexican Americans and and the community at large, like and and the people that are connected with the with the indigenous um sort of groups and calpulis and danzas, like they they understand that the danzantes are always the ones that need to be sort of at the front, leading the way, kind of you know, blessing the path, yeah, clearing the path and things like that.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_02: So uh I don't know how many more years uh uh are the dancer groups gonna be involved with it, but so far, you know, it's it's been it's been a good good uh good ride for for our group.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's awesome.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I just want to take the opportunity to say thank you, my friend, for an awesome second season.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh Yeah, it has been great.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of cool stuff.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, this season we reached over 50,000 downloads, which is something that had yeah that could never even cross my mind that we would reach that many people that would listen to our little show over here.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it feels like we're hitting our stride.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: Like we've found like we've got the the uh the path.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like, like we've really we've hit the ground running and we've we have a clear objective and I think we're doing good work.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: It just feels good to have people reach out now and then and be like, I really like your show.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody recognized um my Tales from Oslantis t-shirt the other day.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, they did?
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and they were like, Do you listen to that?
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, it's my podcast.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh shit.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_02: When I was down in San Antonio for the Western History Association conference, I ran into a couple of people that uh I happen to know, and um, you know, they listen to the podcast, and so it's you know, people are recognizing the the work that we're doing here, and and they appreciate um what we bring, right?
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_02: We we we we bring topics that are relevant to our community, but we also try not to sugarcoat them when the truth, even when it hurts, needs to be told.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think that's something that a lot of people really uh appreciate about what we do is that we're honest, we're frank, um, we're straightforward.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, we joke around and we might be a little snarky, and some folks don't like that, and I'm sorry for them, but you don't have to listen.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to listen.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_02: But don't give us bad reviews.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 47:30
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're listening, um yeah, give us give us some reviews.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: If you've got the the app open on your phone, just hit the uh the review button, give us a rating and a review, it always helps.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_01: And don't help us on the algorithms.
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_02: Go to the shop and buy some merch, support the merch, hit up the Patreon, uh become a member.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_02: Three bucks a month.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_02: We've got more stuff in the pipeline.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_02: We got more.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_02: This is just the end of the season, but we we still have things planned for the remainder of the year, and we have uh, you know, a whole slate of topics that need to be covered still for season three.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_02: We we haven't run out of ideas.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_02: No, we still got a whole lot more shit to talk.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_02: So get us up there and uh in in follows and in reviews and patron support, and we can make this a full-time gig and we'll give you all the content you want.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_02: True that.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: And remember, the truth, well, it's like medicine.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't always taste good, but it's always good for you.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_01: Happy the other loss mortal vassan.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for listening to Tales from Osatlandis, a project of the Gemali Institute of Mesoamerican Arts.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_01: If you enjoy the show, please consider becoming a Patreon supporter.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: You can do this by visiting TalesFromositlandis.com and clicking Support the Podcast.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: Your continued support will help keep the podcast ad free and independent.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_01: Until next time, D Moli does it.