Student's comments on the subject of US Latino/Chicano Literature

I don’t know where to begin. On some levels I feel like I can relate to Piri but on others I can’t. I have so many thoughts on the matter and am deeply impressed by his accounts. The last time I had this sort of “gut reaction” in reading a book was when I read the Kite Runner . I have had a sheltered and happy upbringing compared to what is being portrayed in the book, so I can’t fully understand these struggles completely. Having said this, I wanted to put to paper some of the thoughts I have on the main themes of the book.  As a title for this blog post, I refer to Shakespeare's Hamlet. This question "to be or not to be" holds value in all aspects of life, and in the context of this book it ties in with identity, recognition, life, death, nationhood, manhood, and many more.  After reading the first part I went back to the prologue. I think the entirety of it can be tied into that short prologue “I’m here, and I want recognition, whatever that mudde...

When reading on the background and context of the corrido , I was somewhat intrigued by how morality is portrayed . The author gives the background information in the evolution of the corrido, as it was driven from the very action of Border Conflict. We come to know the agency of the Ballad maker. I find interesting how the choices made by these anonymous people shape the story of a hero, but ultimately how they shape the cultural representation of those that lived at the Border. I think this is where we find a “kink” in the corrido. There are several other examples of this ‘twisting/bending’ of morality. Firstly, themes were imported from the Greater Mexico corrido tradition such as love tragedy and filial disobedience, the border ballads then evolved from this to their own “niche” of themes. Other aspects were also imported such as the dark brooding ballad and those that are more sentimental such as Mexican danzas . The kink I think begins when all of this is ...

While reading this first part of the novel, what struck me the most at first was the structure in which we find it. The first page starts with the music notes for the Corrido of Gregorio Cortez. And then we go into the contextualization of the story in Chapter 1, where the author gives an understanding of the different special settings and actors of this story. In Chapter 2 we find the telling of the legend. I found that it was being told as if someone was reading it out loud, transmitting it orally as one does around a campfire. That is how this legend was passed down, through singing this corrido. Chapter 3 brings a firm, somewhat biographical account of The Man himself and finally Chapter 4 goes into the progress of this person as a folklore hero. We note that there is a clear difference of the telling of the legend in chapter 2 versus chapter 3. In chapter 3 we receive more specific information, names, dates, the consequences and his descendants, this is where we...