“Soy América Latina un pueblo sin piernas pero que camina.” (I’m Latin America a people without legs yet walks.) (Latinoamérica, Calle 13).

All of our discussions in class from the beginning of the year were about how Latin America came to be, their founding story. And for most of the countries and definitely Latin America as a whole it’s hard to define exactly how they came to be or what exactly makes up Latin America and makes their culture uniquely theirs. That’s why I love this line so much. This is a people that while they don’t know their background completely they keep moving forward.

 

 But I think that is how they actually define themselves. Every day they define more and more who and what Latin America is. Their culture is constantly changing and I think that’s what solidifies them. They are able to keep walking through it all and not get discouraged and give up, but keep making things their own. Latinoamérica is basically all about stickin’ it to the man. They aren’t going to let anyone get in their way.

Recently in my Doctrine and Covenants class we have been talking about the revelation that came to President Spencer W. Kimball saying all worthy males could receive the priesthood. (Don’t worry, this really does tie in with the topic). There is a black guy in the class and he asked the teacher if he could take a few minutes today in class and talk about it from his perspective since he felt it was his duty. He basically said that while we have no idea where exactly this policy came from to begin with, all he knows is that we have a prophet leading us today and that the Church is true so nothing else matters. He said how he doesn’t worry about it at all; it doesn’t even bother him. He accepts the past and keeps on going. This is what Latin America does. They might not know where exactly they came from, yet they keep on going; the past doesn’t hold them up or hinder their progress. “Vamos caminando.”

I searched high and low for the clip from La Misma Luna that I wanted to write about, but to no avail. So subtitle quotes will have to do. It’s when Carlitos is eating lunch with his dad, Oscar.

–Where’s your mother? (Oscar)

–In Los Angeles. Can you take me to her? (Carlitos)

–Rosario didn’t come with you?

 –I’m traveling alone.

–How long has she been in Los Angeles?

–Four years.

–Four years?! That’s a long time to be away isn’t it?

–Not as long as you. I’d never even met you. But if you take me to Los Angeles maybe you and mom can make up.

–She would never forgive me.

–I think she would. I know I would.

Carlitos proceeds to pay for the check when it arrives which brings tears to Oscar’s eyes. I couldn’t help but think of the theme of redemption as I watched this. It sounded like Oscar made some mistakes in the past, but Carlitos readily forgave him. I felt like him paying for the check was his way of saying that he forgives his dad for not being there all growing up. It’s a touching scene that gets reduced to nothing when his dad never actually shows up to give him a ride. So, Oscar had this redemption dangling in front of him and he turned it away? Why did he do that? What drives a person to reject forgives and a second chance?

Obviously the theme of redemption reminded me of that scene from The Mission where Rodrigo is “released” from his burden and starts to cry. It seems as though Oscar and Rodrigo had a similar reaction to their being forgiven. Why then were the outcomes so different? What causes someone to either accept or reject redemption and another chance to start over? My initial response is that they feel like they have done too much wrong to be forgiven or they don’t think that the second chance would actually work or they just don’t want to change. But how does that response in this movie go with the plot as opposed to Oscar accepting the forgiveness? In my mind as I was watching it I could just imagine Oscar driving him back and all of them ending up as a happy little family. I realized though that this movie is about portraying real life, not some picture perfect kids show. It’s about showing the world the rough, not too pretty lives of immigrants. Would it have had the same effect on viewers if it were reversed?

One of my favorite things we have talked about this semester is Levinas’ theory about totality and infinity. It’s not exactly Latin Americanesque on the surface, but you can see it everywhere and anywhere. It’s amazing how many times I have thought of this theory as we have been reading different works in this class or watching the different films. It’s also been interesting to realize how many times I’ve thought about it outside of class.

Just a little reminder about what the theory is: There is yourself, and everyone else that’s not you is an “other.” In understanding these “others” there are two ways to approach them. One way is through totality where you look at them as this kind of pie chart and if you can fill in all the pieces then you will know exactly who they are; you can label them. The other way is through the infinity approach where no matter how much you learn there is always more to find out; you will never be able to label them as something specific. Another way of describing this is that totality is more harsh and grasping while infinity is more gentle and caressing.

When I first learned about this it made me analyze what kind of a person I am, do I just try to figure things out and label them or do I accept things as they are and slowly try to unfold some of the mysteries? I feel like when you first meet someone it’s only natural to want to “understand” them and instantly label them into a category. Since learning this theory though, I’ve been trying harder to just realize that labels don’t explain what someone really is. People are too complex to fit inside narrow, undefined assumptions. So why do we keep putting labels on people?

“Then my mind wandered and my thoughts became a living part of me” (Rudolfo Anaya, Bless Me, Ultima, 187).

We are always thinking. It’s just what we do. Our minds are never at rest; even while we sleep we dream the different thoughts we have. So, what does it mean to have these thoughts become a living part of us? Honestly, I think they are already a living part of us. We just don’t realize that they are. We don’t take time to stop and think about how every single thought we have is shaping our lives. How do they shape our lives though? It’s all about agency, about our choices. We get to decide how these thoughts will play inside our heads.

An example of a thought: “I like that person’s sweater.” Now, there are lots of different reactions we could take from here. We can become jealous either to the point of just thinking how jealous we are or actually taking action on this new found jealousy. We can complement them on the sweater we like so much and be grateful they were wearing it so we could see it. We can decide that the thought we just had wasn’t really that important and dismiss it. Our thoughts, big or little, are what make us alive and living. If our brain stops working, we die.  

I think what Antonio is saying is that he finally realized how important and amazing his thoughts are and can be. He found the worth contained in his thoughts and how life-changing they truly are. We can let our thoughts consume us or we can learn how to guide them and let them lead our lives to where we want to be. I found this interesting:

 

What do you make of it?

“Another thing I did that summer was to confirm Cico’s story. I followed the line of water Cico said was drawn around the town, and it was true, the entire town was surrounded by water!” (Rudolfo Anaya, Bless Me, Ultima, 124)

We talked in class how water always symbolizes something in literature, and this obviously means something! But we never discussed what exactly it meant. So I wanted to delve a little deeper into it. In a sense, you could say this story is “waterlogged” (excuse the pun). It seems as though every time Antonio crosses a bridge or is by the river he either crosses into a place far different than where he just came or he learns something new that will change his six-year-old life forever. And there is water everywhere!

In my mental search for other uses of water like this one, Inception came to mind. Every time they come out of one level of a dream state it is through water. In other words, they use water to symbolize this sort of portal between different worlds.

 

Anaya does this same thing. He doesn’t exactly use it to symbolize a different world but a new phase of life or some new knowledge or understanding that has taken place. He uses it as turning points for Antonio. The fact that the water surrounds the entire town where he lives seems pretty significant as well. It’s clear that his mom and dad have certain dreams in mind for their children. The older sons have gone outside this level of the “dream” and have their own dreams now, and they go off to live their own lives. The more Antonio is by the water and the more knowledge he gains the more he realizes he has the choice to fit in this “dream” that has been created or not. I find it interesting that the myth Antonio learns is that the whole city will be drowned into the water surrounding it. Could this be the washing out completely of the parents’ level of the dream? 

And just one more comment...it's my birthday :)

 

What happened in the beginning and what happened in the end were the same. People started playing music and dancing to the beat. It made it feel like nothing in between even really mattered at all in the end. All that mattered was the music, the beat, and the dance. Which makes sense, considering over half the movie had that continuous beat playing in the background. Why was that the central focus though?

There is obviously a pretty straight-forward connection between this plot and the Greek myth about Orpheus and Eurydice. So why portray it in this way? Why with music and dance at the heart? It took me back to the carnivalesque theory we talked about in class. The whole film is a dance between two differing subjects: joy and sadness, life and death, love and hate, frivolity and humility. And just like in a real dance, there is no “winner” out of the two partners; they both dominate at different times and yet work together to create one whole revolving masterpiece. A perfect song about just this concept is “I Hate You Then I Love You.” Quite humorous in my opinion:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_Y0tC31VcA

 There is this natural dance and beat that we all feel in life. We’re dancing with the opposites that life brings, with the good and bad of every day. There’s no stopping it. Just like the beginning and ending of this film portray, the dance is eternal. It’s never over.

“While others more foresighted than they had got their money out of Santo Domingo and had gone to New Orleans, or were starting new coffee plantations in Cuba, those who had salvaged nothing reveled in their improvidence, in living from day to day, in freedom from obligations, seeking, for the moment, to suck from everything what pleasure they could find” (Alejo Carpentier, The Kingdom of This World, 76-77).

This sounds like a pretty nice concept—to get the most out of life that you can, just living up every moment to its fullest—as opposed to the people who take the more responsible route and try to get their lives in perfect order and harmony. As I was thinking about these two different views on life I couldn’t help but notice that these two views are usually what the two main characters in almost every movie ever made have. One of the characters is the responsible one who has a routine and order in their lives. The other character lives day by day and tries to have as much fun as they can while living it. Basic plot: they meet, they can’t stand each other, they start to like the other point of view, they fall in love or begin to see eye to eye and live happily ever after.

Why do we find such joy in this? How can we watch movie after movie or read book after book about this same exact situation? Why are they so central to life? I’m no expert, but having these differing personalities is what runs the world. If we were all straight-laced and never stepped aside from our order we would never invent new things, try different concepts, find all the joy available in life. On the other hand, if we were all care-free it would be a miracle if anything actually got done that needed to get done.

Balance is the key. It’s as soon as that balance starts dying that things get out of hand in life. But if they’ve already started to get unbalanced like in Carpentier’s book, how do you bring it back to balance?

“In literature it is only necessary to outline the steps. Let the people dance!” (Anthony Kerrigan, Introduction to Ficciones, 10).

Sometimes I feel as though people read way too much into things. I’ve always had the thought, “what if the authors really didn’t mean anything when they wrote it? What if they just wanted to watch everyone else interpret meaning into a meaningless story, poem, etc.?” This quote feels exactly like that to me…

The authors can make up whatever “steps” they want! Make it as ridiculous and impossible as they want! They don’t have to actually dance the dance. They get to watch us as we awkwardly try to follow in their written footsteps.

For example, I found this on-line:

A Meaningless Poem

Sounds
When they follow you like dogs
In the forest of silence,
Itch-afflicted, skeletal loneliness
When it litters
Offspring of dreams
In shallow ponds of evenings;
The crows perched
On branches of the sun
Then fly away. 

By Naseer Ahmed Nasir

As I started reading it I just thought of how ridiculous it was. It makes absolutely no sense! But then somewhere deep inside my humanities brain there is a voice that says that there has to be some sort of meaning in this. It can’t really be meaningless! That has meaning in and of itself, right? The fact that it’s supposed to have no meaning? But then my mind again goes to the little detail that the author just won by getting me to think that at all; he got to watch me dance his nonsense dance right in front of him! How embarrassing…

So can there truly be something that has no meaning? Are our minds so intent on putting a label on everything that we can never let something just be? And if so, why do we have to give it meaning? And can there ever be just one “right” meaning?

 Jose Clemente Orozco’s Prometheus painting in Mexico.

 

What initially drew me to this painting was the title. In my Greek and Roman Mythology class we talked a lot about Prometheus and how he stole fire from Zeus and brought it down to earth. I found out that Orozco did a mural of almost this same thing earlier that same year in the United States.

Jose Clemente Orozco’s Prometheus mural at Pomona College in California.

  

So, why are they different? Well, for Orozco everything that he painted had a reason, and not merely to look cool. The fire Prometheus stole usually represents wisdom or new knowledge (which seems fitting for a mural at a college). In the mural there is a good mix of people reaching for and embracing the fire and people looking away from it in fear. In the painting, there are only two other people and they are cowered in fear. Again, what is that supposed to mean? Wouldn’t people be so excited to have more knowledge and wisdom?!

At this point, the Mexican Revelution had just happened. Although many thought the revelotion was wonderful, Orozco saw it in more of a different light in that it brought about some great changes but with some bad consequences.  The sense of this painting is exactly that—with the good comes the bad; it’s not always strictly the good OR the bad.

I think a lot of times in life we want to label an event that happened in our lives as a good thing or a bad thing. The fact is that all of these “things” whether good or bad have equally significant meaning in our lives in both good and bad ways. It’s important to step back and take a look at how these “good” and “bad” events are actually shaping our lives in ways we didn’t realize; we need a dose of pserspective.

“But a humane social order is not always achieved without the grotesque, and sometimes not without the cruel” (Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, Father versus Mother, 89).

The minute I read this my mind flashed back to the movie The Prestige. It went specifically to near the beginning of the movie when they are at a magic show and see the trick of the vanishing bird cage. You find out later the way they did it was through killing the birds in a collapsible bird cage.

Going to a magic show is a perfectly acceptable form of entertainment. Everyone loves watching amazing, seemingly impossible feats become possible right before their eyes. To keep up with this natural societal order of watching magic they on occasion used some “grotesque” methods to keep ahead in the game.

But how could that still be considered “humane” as Machado states? Part of me thinks we desensitize ourselves as a people. One person calls something normal that may not be quite so normal, and everyone believes him because they want to enjoy whatever he called normal. For example, people liked watching the bird cage disappear and decided it had to be fine then. It’s all about fitting in, about being in the social “norm” of things.

Another part of me thinks it has to do with the fact that everything has its opposite. Maybe we need the “grotesque” and the “cruel” to know when something actually is humane and decent. Without it, there is no way to measure the difference or the progress.

So does Machado’s statement actually have hints of truth laced in it, or is it yet another one of his overtly sarcastic remarks?

“He then separated himself from her in order to have the pleasure of returning to her” (Jose de Alencar, Iracema, 77).

How often do we do this in life? We love something so much that after we are with it for a bit we put it back in its box, or room, or wherever it came from just so we can come back to it later and love it just as much as the first time we were with it? For example: a delicious chocolate cake.

You eat a piece of it and love every bite. Then you put it away for a while and come back to it later to enjoy yet another wonderful piece of chocolate cake. You find yourself doing this again and again because it is just that amazing! If you ate the whole cake at once the joy and deliciousness of it would wear off and even have the risk of becoming loathsome to you.

Some would say that is too much of a good thing...

On the other hand we have the Mexican painter Jose Maria Velasco who was born and raised in Mexico and painted the valley of Mexico countless times, always finding new aspects of beauty and wonder in the landscape around him. He never seemed to tire of that valley.

So what makes the difference? Are some people born with that feeling of the need to change, keep moving on to new things, or do people chose that kind of a mentality? And if you are born with a certain outlook, can you change that perception with time or is it simply too ingrained in your nature?

Is there any real way to find out?

“The honey of Iracema’s lips is like the honeycomb which the bee makes in the trunk of the Guabiroba: poisonous is its sweetness” (Jose de Alencar, Iracema, 26).



Iracema the Guardian

All throughout history we hear/read/watch things about a beautiful woman who has a dangerous secret within her that usually ends, inadvertently or not, in tragedy, grief, pain, etc. Iracema is a classic example of this. As also is Pandora. They are both seen as women “born” from nature in a way. Iracema is the essence of nature, and Pandora was created by the gods from the earth. They both innocently bring sadness into the world, Pandora with her box containing all the evils of the world and Iracema betraying the secret of the Jurema. Yet in spite of the sadness they bear children who become the principle people of new nations. Out of tragedy comes miracles; out of death comes life.


Pandora's box

 

This brings me to the question of why we see this pattern so often in history. As Octavio Paz put it, “woman is a living symbol of the strangeness of the universe…the supreme mystery” (The Labyrinth of Solitude, 66). Women are confusing; they are a mystery to the world. No one quite understands them which I think is what makes them such great characters to portray. There is this quest to find out if they really are perfect through and through as their beauty portrays or if there is something deadly within them just below the surface.

 

Being a woman, I think it is safe for me to say that there is more to a woman than meets the eye. I am positive that this topic will continue to be seen in different mediums as time ticks on. This shows just how influential women really are that authors, artists, and directors will still continue to try and solve this great unsolvable mystery known as the woman.

"Though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains...and have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor...and though I give my body to be burned...and have not love, it profiteth me nothing. Love suffereth long and is kind. Love envieth not. Love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up. When I was a child, I spake as a child...I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I put away childish things. But now abideth faith, hope, love...These three. But the greatest of these is love" (The Mission).

Rodrigo was reading from 1 Corinthians at this point in the movie. This theme of love stuck out strongly to me throughout the whole movie. Rodrigo progressively learned more and more about what love truly is. It started out with more of a lustful love. He is in love with a woman who no longer loves him but loves another man. Rodrigo ends up killing the guy in a dual because of the pain of lost love he felt. He thought he knew love and it ran away from him.

He then becomes a Jesuit and studies about what love is in the Bible. As he does this he puts this study into action and helps the Indian tribe build their new town. He begins to understand how much more to life there really is and how filling your life with that kind of love is worth more than anything else.

Then comes the test; when the people are ordered to leave he decides to fight with them, renouncing his vows as a Jesuit. Now, at first this seems like he is putting his love for these people above his love for God. Father Gabriel has made the choice that his love for God will come first and he will die keeping his vows to Him. This made me question if Rodrigo had actually learned what love really was and how God always should come first. But as I thought about it, God has given us our freedom and lets us protect that right. So, did Rodrigo do right by having such pure love for the Indians that he died fighting with them? Had he learned what true love was? Or would it have been better for him to die as Father Gabriel, faithful in his vows to the end, showing God his love and devotion to Him? Would that have been a more correct form of love? Honestly, I feel both demonstrated love in its purest form as they died. There is no wrong way to express true love such as this.

 

“This phenomenon of a return to the maternal womb . . . is without doubt one of the determining causes of the swift popularity of the cult of the Virgin. . . . The Catholic Virgin is also the Mother . . ., but her principal attribute is not to watch over the fertility of the earth but to provide refuge for the unfortunate. The situation has changed: the worshipers do not try to make sure of their harvests but to find a mother’s lap. The Virgin is the consolation of the poor, the shield of the weak, the help of the oppressed.” (Octavio Paz, “The Labyrinth of Solitude,” 84-85)

I served a Spanish speaking mission in Arizona and La Virgen de Guadalupe was everywhere:

shrines outside houses,

cars,

cakes,

bottle cap openers...

I knew she was important (being the mother of Jesus and all), but I never understood why Catholics worshipped and adored her so much. Paz sheds a great deal of light on this subject. He takes it back to their origin. They had formerly been worshiping male gods of all types. When the Spaniards came and took over they banned this kind of practice. They tore to shreds everything that the Mexican Indians had believed and everything they had done for the past years. I can imagine they were a little shaken up. So to make up for it they focused their adoration on a more motherly figure, whether consciously or unconsciously. We all have this innate knowledge since the time we are born that our mothers love us. As we grow they nurture us and somehow, magically make everything better. When we get hurt we go to our moms to bandage us up. When we are sick we go to our moms to make us all better. Paz describes how the Indians did this same thing. They went to the Virgin to find solace and peace.

“In sum, she is the Mother of orphans.” (Octavio Paz, “The Labyrinth of Solitude,” 85)

From what I said earlier I agree that the Virgin could be considered “the Mother of orphans” seeing as the Indians lost their first idol gods, or their first “parents.” Being an orphan wasn't all sunshine and roses for them, so  they looked to the Virgin as their newly acquired mother. 

 

“. . . It will be pleasing to God if . . . these peoples are introduced into and instructed in the Holy Catholic Faith, and the devotion, trust and hope which they now have in their idols turned so as to repose in the divine power of the true God; for it is certain that if they should serve God with that same faith, fervour, and diligence, they would work many miracles.”  (Hernan Cortes, Encounters, 83)

Why does everyone want religion? And what makes some people think they found the right one and should impose it on everyone else?

It goes back to a search for knowledge, a search for truth. As humans we always want to be updated on the latest info and know all the secrets. We not only want to know this information but know that these facts we found are the truth. Unfortunately, there are many cases in which they are not true. People skew data, or things get misinterpreted.  In religion, it is the same way. We have this natural desire to know the truth. Is there a God? Do I have a purpose in life? We have the answers to these questions, but they too get misinterpreted or changed. Truth can be found in every religion. As Cortes writes, it is evident that he believes he has the whole truth about religion and that he has the right one. His mind is so closed to the fact that the natives could have any truths in their worship.

In that time period it was all about conquest, about conquering and taking over and imposing your beliefs and cultural habits on everything in sight. The way this was done was usually through bloodshed. What they did not realize is that if they took time to learn about the other culture and learn their customs and rites of worship they too would find truth there. As people learn to give and take, to really study out for themselves the truth from the lies, they will find the real truth. That knowledge would have increased Cortes’ power in the end. He could have gained their trust and really helped them learn all the truth they could by building off of what they already knew. This would have saved a lot of the bloodshed and fear that Cortes caused. Who knows what their culture would be like today?