Although I am not fully sure if this constitutes a line, the stanza above from Anzaldúa’s La Frontera illuminates a dichotomy between land and landowner in order to disprove the treatment of Mexicans, Native Americans, and chicanos by white invaders. In essence, the stanza demonstrates that while the new settlers may control la tierra in the eyes of the law, it is the native peoples who will always have the rights to the land in the eyes of a divine, higher calling. On the fifth page of the first chapter, Anzaldua offers a brief history into the original settlement of the Americas, and the subsequent conquest by the Spaniards, as a way to deepen the connection between the natives and their homeland. Another creative decision by the author in order to further her point regarding territorial rights include her use of Spanish, which, in an irony surely not lost on Anzaldúa, has become the native language for the Mexican/chicanos, contrasting the white man’s use of English, who she oftens refers to as “Anglo-terrorists.” Yet my favorite illustration of her commitment occurs within the stanza itself. Anzaldúa makes a clear distinction that the land was Mexican for a period of time, but it was, it is, and it always will be Indian land. Particular emphasis is placed at the end of each line, once, always, is, again, to drive this point home. And while chapter 7 is a call for unity among all mistreated Indians and chicanos, Anzaldúa concedes that the first natives of the land will always have the strongest claim to la frontera.
“The coming together of two self-consistent but habitually incompatible frames of references causes un choque, a cultural collision.” Pg. 100
Identity sits at the front of Anzaldua’s work and narrative, making her voice as both a poetess in “To live in the Borderlands means you,” and author in Borderlands/La Frontera deeply intertwined with her personal experience, opinion, and reason. This quotation encapsulates the depth of her struggle with identity by literally comparing versatile allegiance to a painful accident and imminent damage.
Through this quotation she couples internalized displacement with pairs and groups of contrasting personas. At one point, she alludes to a death of indigenous and Mexican tradition to the brutality of the colonizer. Her metaphor of contrasting pairs of identity thus extends beyond the barriers of a single page, and into her broader argument of identity. Her work shines light on the extended validity of Mexican and Chicanx rights as they represent aspects of indigenous struggle–an identity deeply intertwined in American history yet uprooted in our whitewashed America. The traditional and the rightful stark in contrast to the invasive and deadly. She then encourages a consideration of this traditional identity as it is forced to mold to that of the industrial complex with every new generation, encouraging empathy and demanding change.
There is pain and confusion in her authorship, yet a steely outrage oozing out of the realities of her narrative and experience. Anzaldua quotes El Puma, “North Americans call [the return of Chicanos and Mexicans] to the homeland the silent invasion,” and I wonder how loudly she wants her narrative voice to ring, to contrast the silence, and urge her readers to raise their fists in allegiance with the preservation of identity.
“The Gringo, locked into the fiction of white superiority, seized complete political power, stripping Indians and Mexicans of their lands while their feet were still rooted in it” (p.7).
Gloria Anzaldúa gives us this image of the tyrannical Gringo, obsessed with his own self-worth and quest for complete obedience from those that are supposedly inferior. The white colonists are clearly in the wrong. Anzaldúa makes that clear with a list of the personal and systemic transgressions against the Chicanos. This “fiction of white superiority” must have come from a place of fear. Fear of a different people and different values could have been a powerful motive for the white race to try eradicating the native culture while trying to exploit the labor. I can almost see the fear behind the Gringo’s gaze of hatred and posed confidence.
On page 105, Anzaldúa mentions that her father’s machismo included supporting the family with a strong attitude but letting the love shine through. Anglos warped that meaning and turned it into something different and wrong because they felt “inadequate and inferior and powerless” (p.105) in front of this strong Chicano people. All this adversity hasn’t broken the Chicanos. It surprised me how much faith Anzaldúa has in this group of people that has taken so much hardship. She believes that what’s more important than the image of the white aggressor is the image of the strong, adaptive, multicultural man or woman who lives on the edge but hasn’t given up.
Anzaldúa writes this from the perspective of someone who has seen the hardship herself and lives on the border every day. Living between worlds isn’t easy, and her writing style conveys this well. This is done by sprinkling Spanish words into the English which gives some added perspective to the code switching that so many people go through day to day.
“Soy un amasamiento, I am an act of kneading, of uniting and joining that not only has produced both a creature of darkness and a creature of light, but also a creature that questions the definitions of light and dark and gives them new meanings” (Anzaldúa, 103).
In this quote, Gloria Anzaldúa beautifully describes her identity as a queer mestiza woman working to break down the very walls that define her, borderland dwellers, and people all over the world. Her amasamiento identity, although it creates a great deal of internal distress and questioning, is the very thing that enables her to redefine the light and the dark, the powerful and the not, and the borders drawn by man. As shown many times, borders are unnatural to land and people alike but have been created to elevate those on one side of the border. In Chapter One of her Borderlands, Anzaldúa notes that from Border Field Park, one can see “silver waves marbled with spume // gashing a hold under the border fence” (1) and one the next page she remarks that “the skin of the earth is seamless // The sea cannot be fenced, // el mar does not stop at the borders. // To show the white man what she thought of his // arrogance, // Yemaya blew that wire fence down” (2-3). In this case, the border wall between the countries of Mexico and the United States was created to elevate the white imperialist north of the border. A border between male and female traits was drawn to elevate the male to power in a patriarchal society. The same goes for the border between those who identify as “straight” and those who identify as part of the LGBTQ community, creating a heteronormative culture in many parts of the world.
The mestiza is a byproduct of these manmade borders, be they literal or societal. She walks the line, collecting broken shards of different identities: Chicano, Anglo, Indian, female, male, straight, queer. This combination all kneaded together makes for a lot of identity confusion within the mestiza, a creature of darkness and a creature of light. However do not be mistaken, this amasamiento is a beautiful creature, one who is destined to change the world by questioning the definitions of light and dark and redefining them. She questions the tensions between the white and Chicano, between the female and male, the straight and the queer. She redefines what it means to be a certain race, gender, or sexual orientation thus breaking down borders both geographical and figurative to redistribute power and come home.
“So yes, though ‘home’ permeates every sinew and cartilage in my body, I too am afraid of going home.” Page 21
This deceptively simple line demonstrates an important theme in this text. While Anzaldua respects and honors her cultural identity, she is aware of its flaws and insecure about her place within it.
First, this line speaks to the inherent violence in the history of Latin American and indigenous communities. Anzaldua recounts epidemics of violence, famine, disease and genocide that forged place she calls home. And while she honors her legacy, she notes that she is part conqueror and part victim, and that to deny either one is equally wrong. Her ‘home’, her cultural and personal identity, is a mosaic of all of the good and the evil that has come before her.
Anzaldua also understands that her individuality has isolated herself from her community. In her culture, women are often expected to fulfill a rigidly defined subservient role in the patriarchy. Anyone who resists this destiny faces ostracization. She describes how she was mocked for studying and how her queerness was considered to be “the ultimate rebellion.” This means that her sense of self is indelibly linked to a culture that rejects central tenets of her being.
This line especially resonated with me because I am biracial and because I was raised in Miami, a definitive cultural crossroad. I have seen how the ideals of one culture can conflict with with those of another, and how one can feel intense pressure to walk the tightrope between both. I have also seen how individual traits can be red flags to communities and can label them as outcasts. Many outsiders, both those secure in their own cultures and those that spectate others’, simply wonder why the ‘rebels’ and ‘misfits’ don’t just abandon their culture. But Anzaldua understands that each of us has an individual place in our home, even if that means embracing the paradox of being an outsider within it. Or, in her words her words: “I am a turtle, wherever I go I carry ‘home’ on my back.”
“Soy un amasamiento, I am an act of kneading, of uniting and joining that not only has produced both a creature of darkness and a creature of light, but also a creature that questions the definitions of light and dark and gives them new meanings” (Anzaldua 103).
Upon reading this line for the first time, my mind pictured dough being kneaded, and the many identities Anzaldua possesses mixed together to represent how connected each of her identities are. However, Anzaldua writes that she is “the act of kneading” itself, and by the use of a gerund, Anzaldua highlights she is truly the continuous and ongoing progress that joins her identities together – creating something bigger than herself. She is an action; challenging the exclusive habits of convergent thinking and the rigidness that surrounds identity.
The beginning of the line focuses on her individual “uniting and joining”, but the product that she creates confronts the greater society and provides new meanings for “creatures” like her. The structure is similar to the way Anzaldua writes throughout the whole text, as she often refers to her own personal experience, then speaks openly of any one living in borderlands. With this single line, she captures the intricacy of her own individuality and then further, the power of her intersectionality to push and explore social boundaries. Anzaldua challenges the social proscriptions of the way women should be, of masculinity, of homosexuality, and of a hierarchy of races. By virtue of Anzaldua being a crossroads between multiple cultures, races, languages, and more, she is in a place of inferiority, and also a place of power. She has knowledge of different identities which provides her with versatility and the ability to find common ground with others. As la mestiza, she does not remain within the strict constraints borders attempt to make, but rather is flexible and fluid among all sides. As the embodiment of borderlands, la mestiza approaches and dissects fixed, sociocultural patterns that lie at the foundations of society.
La mestiza holds the connections between cultures, races, sexualities, and languages and demonstrates that she is made of multiple borders. As Anzaldua writes, she weaves her stories, her family’s stories, poetry, and history together which, for the reader, unfolds to become the borderlands itself – a crossroads of her identities. The borderlands lose the simple image of a place for the reader, and become a body, a mind, and/or a soul of someone. My position as a reader is challenged as those who live in the borderlands may or may not physically be living in-between locations. The borderlands are composed internally within people, or individuals create their own borderlands to be in. It challenges me as a reader to explore if I am in borderlands of my own, and the intersections of my own identities as they relate. Anzaldua focuses the grey space that is often ignored by the loudness of the black and white. She resists the idea of a border itself by putting attention on the grey space of the borderlands, and further highlights the complexities and disruption that a border can create.
“And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country-a border culture” (Anzaldúa 3).
I was born and raised in San Diego. So the minute Anzaldúa started describing Border Field Park, the “chainlink fence crowned with rolled barbed wire”, “el llorido del mar, and “el respiro del aire”, I was there. My Dad took me and my sister to Border Field Park once, and we walked along the dirt road trail to the beach, to the American side of the fence. The beach on the American side was empty. I remember putting my feet in the cold water and watching a few seagulls roaming nearby. The Mexican side, on the other hand, was full of life, of dogs and families with umbrellas and picnics. I remember thinking it so odd how the border fence just ended in the ocean, how it seemed like anyone could just swim around it. It barely felt like we were at the border of two different countries. Then we went to the border fence, which has holes so tiny so the families chatting on either side of the fence can’t pass money through it. And then we went home, to our home in affluent northern San Diego.
I found this line really interesting because of its description of the border culture as a scab, the product of “una herida abierta”, the unnatural boundary metal boundary that stretches into a rippling and uncontrollable sea. The border culture, according to Anzaldúa, is a land of confusion, of two cultures becoming one, and is a land avoided by most. Its inhabitants are the “prohibited and forbidden”, considered by gringos to be “transgressors, aliens…”. It’s certainly true in San Diego. There was a reason I didn’t see any gringo San Diegan families having picnics by that metal fence. Most San Diegans, or at least those with no ties to Mexico, pretend the border doesn’t exist, pretend the open wound created by it doesn’t affect our lives and the lives of everyone around us every day. While San Diego’s undocumented immigrants are often exploited due to fear of deportation and San Diego has one of the biggest human trafficking problems in this nation (Anzaldúa focuses on the trafficking of Mexican women later in this chapter), the shared fear of the borderland and the people that come through it squashes those facts. Instead, San Diego is always advertised as a sunny land of gringo surfers and palm trees with absolutely no scabs from the metal barrier that stretches into the sea.
Anzaldúa’s metaphor of the creation of a border culture as a scab sets up the theme for the rest of her commentary. The reader will most likely think of scabs as undesirable and/or disgusting, and this image placed into the reader’s head works well as Anzaldúa goes on to explain how this opinion causes the borderlands to be ignored and/or feared by many Americans.
“The new mestiza copes by developing a tolerance for contradictions, a tolerance for ambiguity” (Anzaldúa 101).
Anzaldúa speaks of “contradiction” and “ambiguity” and in doing so invokes an extended metaphor of the mestiza’s identity as a geographical border. A border, while a clear geopolitical line that divides two countries, is often the epicenter of cultural mixing and civil ambiguity, as Anzaldúa asserts throughout her writing in her descriptions of growing up in the Borderlands. Instead of a uniform culture and set of values that exists deep in a country’s homogenous heartland, the towns and people living along a border don’t hold values that are exist around a common national or racial identity. The mestizo/a claim multiracial and multinational identities that are often “split” in their psyches, similar to how a border clearly divides two countries.
In a later chapter, Anzaldúa states that the struggle of humans “has always been inner” and that is often “played out in the outer terrains.” This suggests there exists a relationship between the mestizo and the border in which each reinforce each other. The various, distinct mental psyches of the mestizos “played out” into the creating of border towns and confusing environments that hold no clear national or racial identity; mestizos created physical towns with houses and fences and walls that match their own “split” inner psyches. At the same time, however, it is the existence of the Borderlands and the geopolitical border itself that enforces the “split” mindset and the mental walking of the border between two countries that many mestizos experience. This contradictory relationship between mental and physical perhaps exists solely because of the “tolerance for contradictions” that Anzaldúa claims of the new mestiza.
Is the mestiza is someone to pity or someone to celebrate? Speaking as someone with a Mexican father and a white mother, I would say both, and Anzaldúa’s writings suggest that she would agree. I believe that it’s almost impossible to be fully and equally immersed in one’s two cultures; one will inevitably belong to one culture more than the other, which will cause the her pain as she experiences guilt over disconnect with one culture and frustration with her lack of perfect assimilation into the other. Ambivalence is the only solution, as Anzaldúa claims, stating that an inability to flexible can be devastating. But the mestiza should also be celebrated. Anzaldúa suggests that with the mestiza’s new tolerance for contradiction and ambiguity, she is the future in an increasingly connected world and her split mind has the ability to end the world conflict. And I would agree; flexibility in thought and tolerance for contradiction and complication are necessary qualities in whichever minds are put to solve the world’s greatest issues, and in this, a mestiza can thrive.
“1,950 mile-long open wound dividing a pueblo, a culture, running down the length of my body, staking fence rods in my flesh”
After reading through the excerpts from Anzaldua’s piece, this line struck me as especially important to the piece as a whole because it demonstrates the struggle of the Chicano in accepting physical, cultural, and emotional chance. The stark imagery used in this line of the “1,950 mile-long open wound” creates a gruesome image of destruction and pain, but in reality this image refers to the border between the U.S. and Mexico, which is seemingly harmless. On the contrary, Anzaldua shows how a line drawn on a map can create immense division. On the physical level, she describes how a “pueblo”, or town, was literally divided leaving people on both sides of the border. Likewise, this border divides “a culture” by creating uncertainty within the indigenous people because their land is now a white colonists. The indigenous people suffered this “open wound” in a battle they did not want to fight, and now they are divided by the decision to conform or rebel. By describing the wound as “running down the length of [her own] body”, Anzaldua makes the pain felt by all Chicanos personal. It is as though the “wound” splits her two identities, Mexican and American. The border or “wound” thus takes away the autonomy of the individual in this situation because one is expected to follow a certain set of cultural norms or rules depending on which side of the border they fall on. Similarly, the border causes Chicanos to battle internally with what it means to be mixed-race. Anzaldua describes how the border is like “staking fence rods into [her own] flesh” because just as it divides two countries it all divides her. It is as though half her body were pinned to either side of the border, unable to escape to one side stuck in an infinite state of liminality trying to choose to which side you belong.
To survive the Borderlands
you must live sin fronteras
be a crossroads.
– Page 119 To Live in the Borderlands Means You
After reading Anzaldua’s work I find myself choosing this excerpt from her poem To Live in the Borderlands Means You. I have spent my entire life living between cultures. I was raised in both Jewish and Christian faiths, having to be open to two different cultures of religion. At the age of thirteen I moved from Boston, Massachusetts to a tiny island off the coast of southern Georgia. At first I found it difficult to relate to people because of how different they were. Over time I began to understand that although many of their views on faith, politics and culture dramatically opposed my own, I could either choose to focus on our differences or try and see the good that each individual had to offer.
Anzaldua’s message in this stanza encapsulates the overlying message of her entire work. In order to survive an experience in the Borderlands, one must be open to everything and everyone they encounter. The paradox found in this sentence shows the reader how the Mestiza exist, living on a border yet having no borders within themselves. Everyone in this seminar can relate on a deep and personal level to this excerpt. We have all spent a great deal of time in between the border of high school and college. In this time, just as Gloria Anzaldua, we face the challenges of not belonging, being torn between different lives.
Anzaldua uses the word survive to show her readers how difficult it is to reside in a Borderland. No one can live fulfilled in this alien world we call a Borderland. One’s purpose is stripped away, leaving an unclear path clouded with uncertainty and fear. This excerpt ends the poem, To Live in the Borderlands Means You, yet begins the journey of the Mestiza way of life which is vitally important to Anzaldua and her people. They are a “crossroad” between many different cultures that lead to a new species, a new consciousness.
Just as the excerpt I chose ends Anzalduas poem, it prefaces the next two chapters that we were assigned to read. I find this interesting because as we “Febs” start to see the end of our Febmester, we must cross the border into the college world and reinvent ourselves into something new, something without borders.
“I stand at the edge where earth touches ocean/where the two overlap/a gentle coming together/at other times and places a violent clash” (Anzaldua 1).
Instantly, Anzaldua alludes to the conflict of a borderland — in this case, between water and earth — as entirely natural. Upon reading this line, I felt discomfort and a tinge of hopelessness. If the “violent clash” of a border is natural, how can we as humans expect to overcome it? But that is why this line is integral to the soul of Anzaldua’s work; A border can also be a “gentle coming together,” quiet and soft. On page three, she contradicts the message above: “But the skin of the earth is seamless./The sea cannot be fenced,/ el mar does not stop at borders.” She begins to chip away at one’s assumption that when two massive forces come together it must always be a collision. Instead, she challenges us to think of the border as forever shifting, never stagnant, and “in a constant state of transition” (3).
And what of the organisms who live beyond the border? At first glance, the earth and ocean as two very different habitats. Clearly, the things that thrive in one do not in the other. But as I continued to read Anzaldua’s work, it struck me that although this may be true, we are all still made of the same material and require the same things to live. On page 111, she even describes a small bird in a tree over a river as fishlike, as if the two creatures were a reflection of one another. In the context of Borderlands, this encompasses the situation at the United States and Mexican border. Mexico relies heavily on United States industry, and thus Americans rely on Mexican workers. Like the bird eats the fish, and the fish nourishes the bird, the two countries are dependent on one another. How can we expect the border to separate those who rely upon one another? Even her use of Spanish throughout the text encompasses a similar idea. To a bilingual reader, who can straddle the borderland, it is easy to follow the text. But to some, the shift between language can be jarring. When she inserts a Spanish word or phrase, it feels like the gentle wave overlapping the shore. But when a paragraph or an excerpt is entirely in Spanish, it can be a violent clash. Both languages support her thesis. Both nurture one another. But it is the reader’s perspective that cast them as dependent or independent.
The borderlands is a place of erosion. Like a river eats into a canyon, it will always shift into a new era, perhaps of freedom or ownership. Both the earth and sea were used as a vessel for the many invasions that Anzaldua describes over time. We may perceive the act of crossing from the water into land as stepping over a border, an intrusion. Or we can see that standing at the ocean’s edge is to be connected to the entirety of the world. To transcend the borderland mentality is to think of the water and the earth as a single being instead of casting them in duality. If we did this as people, we discover a “hybrid progeny, a mutable, more malleable species” (99). This transition is natural. The concept and destruction of the borderlands are both natural. To stand “at the edge where earth touches ocean” is to be united in both worlds, like Anzaldua herself.
“Indigenous like corn, like corn, the mestiza is a product of crossbreeding, designed for preservation under a variety of conditions.” (Anzaldua 103)
After having read the poem and the chapter excerpts, I found myself drawn to this simple simile as a descriptive tool in the painting of the picture that is the struggle for identity, and the nature of the mestiza. Although she only clearly states their relationship as a shared past in crossbreeding, or lack of a true origin, Anzaldua leaves a world of meaning to be discovered by the reader.
Corn, the cultivation of corn, global reliance on corn, each piece of the context which surrounds such a mundane crop helps to bring the true nature of Anzaldua’s struggle to light. Corn is universal, corn is eternal, corn is a by-product of centuries of intense refinement and evaluation, but most importantly in Anzaldua’s use of the metaphor, corn knows few boundaries. Corn is bound only by geography, yet politically corn is untouched by historical development and global movements. In relating the mestiza struggle for identity and appreciation to corn, Anzaldua describes her movement as global, everlasting, and without care for the complaint of those who seek to quell her revolution.
In continuation, corn and maize products are capable of taking many forms, and in this way Anzaldua accentuates the diversity of her movement. In later excerpts, she explains how her affiliation with the queer and feminist movements have brought her into circles unknown to those choosing not to take part in these movements, how in avoidance of and opposition to the institution of intolerance, she has found herself a part of a community of great diversity, resilience, progressiveness. This community finds roots all across the world, made up of those who feel themselves “outcasts”. And although corn is not considered to be an “outcast” of a crop, its ability to be altered, rendered, and manipulated is incredible, and the ability for all these different products and items to be grouped in the same category is greater still. By relating her movement to corn, Anzaldua insinuates that her struggle is one of a universal and diverse nature.
Anzaldua’s use of a simile, to relate her kind and her struggle to corn, describes them both as universal, progressive, diverse, and everchanging.
“La Mestiza has gone from being the sacrificial goat to becoming the officiating priestess at the crossroads” (Anzaldúa 102).
This excerpt from Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands, La Frontera embodies what it means to be La Mestiza in her eyes, and how La Mestiza has been transformed from a sort of social pariah, into a bridge between cultures. This is why I was drawn to this specific excerpt. Anzaldúa’s use of metaphor illustrates the shift in the role of La Mestiza in a beautiful way that allows the reader to become more deeply acquainted with the position La Mestiza finds herself in. The sacrificial goat is commonly used to reference a sacrifice that must be made for the common good, in this case the bridging of two cultures. This allusion highlights how Anzaldúa, and the broader La Mestiza, is forced to sacrifice parts of herself and her identity to fit into cultural constraints or to sacrifice her safety net of a home to exist in the spaces between her two cultures, risking exclusion from both. Yet, La Mestiza has shifted from the sacrificial goat to the officiating priestess in the eyes of Anzaldúa, so what does this mean for La Mestiza? This is not a shift of La Mestiza’s position externally, but rather a shift in her internal view of her position. In the following paragraph Anzaldúa further explains, “as a mestiza I have no country, my homeland cast me out; yet all countries are mine because I am every woman’s sister or potential lover.” This realization of the true power La Mestiza possesses as a bridge between cultures is what transforms her from a sacrifice to an officiating priestess.
This line is essential to the development of the reader’s understanding of La Mestiza and therefore plays an important role in the chapter as a whole. This line is able to deepen the reader’s connection with Anzaldúa in order to more intimately understand La Mestiza. It reveals both the struggles she faces and the way she uses them to build strength and find a unique identity that exists at the crossroads.
“As refugees in a homeland that does not want them, many find a welcome hand holding out only suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” – Page 12
The irony and paradox employed in this powerful sentence from chapter one of Gloria Anzaldua’s Borderlands/La Frontera provide an insightful glimpse into the complex suffering of Mexican immigrants in America.
Anzaldua’s decision to refer to America as “a homeland” for Mexican immigrants is a clear example of an ironic paradox. “Homeland,” here, is a term clearly rooted in truth, however, the reality for these immigrants is quite obviously the opposite. I chose this sentence because of how it elucidates why I might feel sympathetic and guilty about the history of these Tejanos and their current disposition. She uses the same technique as she depicts “a welcome hand holding out only suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” Clearly the opposite of welcoming, Anzaldua’s ironic and paradoxical description of what awaits successful immigrants drives home the central idea of the first chapter: the “Anglos’” disregard for the land, welfare, and integrity of native Tejanos has resulted in generations of oppression, poverty, and helplessness for many Mexican citizens.
Anzaldua employs paradox and contradiction in a more subtle manner by illustrating the fact that there is no clear decision Mexican citizens can make for a more prosperous or fair way of life. Her bleak depiction of successful immigrants’ unfortunate position comes directly after her description of the perils inherent to their illegal journey across the Mexican-American border. As Anzaldua states, Mexicans who successfully emigrate to America are met with “suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” The decision by Mexican immigrants to merely make this journey, juxtaposed with Anzaldua’s description of what awaits them if they are successful, is paradoxical and gives the reader a clear understanding of the extremely unfavorable disposition Mexican citizens are born into.
“splits me splits me
me raja me raja” – page 2, Borderlands/La Frontera
After re-reading both chapters of Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Fronter as well as her poem To Live In The Borderlands, I found myself repeatedly coming back to this short, simple line. By itself, it is just another line in what is otherwise a great read. However, in the context of the entire piece, I believe it is extremely powerful and highlights an important message.
Every author, every writer, every artist, every musician, and every poet has their own unique style that allows them to stand out from the rest – be it their cadence, their artistic vision, their rhyming patterns, their storytelling techniques, and so on. With Gloria Anzaldúa’s work, the first thing I had noticed was how much of herself she pours into her work. This gives her work a sense of identity that is unique and unparalleled. Despite her works being predominantly in English, she manages to stay true to her Chicana roots. This can be seen as many lines in her work are either partly or completely in Spanish. For example, she switches back and forth from English to Spanish in describing people and various groups (‘los Norteamericanos’, ‘Tejanos’, and ‘la Migra’ are but a few examples).
In a way, this serves as an extended metaphor for Anzaldúa’s own identity; although she is listed on many websites as an American scholar, through her work she constantly reminds us of her Mexican origin. As a reader, this invites us to embrace her not for what she appears to be on the outside, but for who she is at her core. It also implores us to reflect on ourselves as individuals; do we simply accept ourselves for the nationality listed on our passport, the cultural identity of our parents, the environment that we grew up in, or something else entirely? This speaks to me on a very personal level. Despite legally being an American, my family and my roots are entirely Bangladeshi. Growing up in international schools in 3 different countries, I found myself questioning and even running away from my identity multiple times when I was younger. However, as I have grown older I now see it as something not just to accept, but something to be proud of. Thus, Anzaldúa’s work and, specifically in the lines chosen, her choice of repeating herself in Spanish speaks to me on a personal level and draws me to the idea of embracing one’s cultural identity, despite tangible obstructions such as borders and intangible ones alike.
Going back to the original lines aforementioned, I strongly believe everything from her word choice to the placement of the words themselves were intentional; she chose to ‘split’ those two lines in that particular way (the same way she herself is being ‘split’) and for the following lines to be in Spanish. ‘Me raja’ translated to English means ‘I crack’, and serves as both a reminder of Anzaldúa’s origins as well as another powerful way for her to portray the impact of the border on herself. When she writes ‘splits me’, she means all parts of her; her body, her culture, and her soul.
As a reader, I believe this challenges our position and what to expect from Anzaldúa’s work in every single way. Through her unique storytelling methods, the abundance of Spanish vocabulary seamlessly mixed into an English text, her personification of the objects around her, as well as a plethora of visual imagery, Gloria Anzaldúa provides us with a text that is fundamental not only to ‘border texts’, but to cultural and literary texts as a whole, and forces us to challenge our presumptions on borders and identity. What’s more, all of this is brilliantly portrayed in but 1 simple line.
“She learns to transform the small ‘I’ into the total Self” — page 104
I was drawn to this quote because I believe it encapsulates the core of the mestiza consciousness; taking ownership of our conflicting narratives to create an empowered sense of self, one that is not only a fuller individual, but also part of a broader togetherness. To achieve this, we must collect the many pieces that form our identity and embrace their differences, trusting it will lead to our evolution. This idea of bringing together opposites and stirring understanding through empathy is core to Anzaldua’s philosophy. Not only does she write about why we should adhere to her new consciousness, but she also uses her writing as a medium that embodies these beliefs.
Her writing in several ways incorporates the multitudes of her experiences and ancestry, combining elements of Aztec folklore with Catholic prayers, Afro Latino creeds with indigenous philosophies, her white cultural capital and her Chicana identity. In “El camino de la mestiza/The Mestiza Way” (page 104), for example, she alludes to the Tolteca philosophy of creating a harmonious relationship with the self at the same time as she disposes of her American persona’s elements—the ‘muni-bart metromaps’ and her dollars. More notably, she introduces the Aztec legend of the Eagle and the Serpent first as a starting point for a critique of the patriarchy (page 5), but then uses it as an extended analogy to how the mestiza doesn’t pick sides, but rather combines them. Finally, by writing bilingually as well as using a broad range of specific cultural references, Anzaldua persuades the reader to seek a deeper understanding of her reality, one that does not exclude or hides her borderland identity, and, thus, has them empathize with her worldview. Indeed, her writing aims to teach the reader how to transform their singular experiences into an intersection, a crossroads, where they can, too, create a new multifaceted identity.
Although I am not fully sure if this constitutes a line, the stanza above from Anzaldúa’s La Frontera illuminates a dichotomy between land and landowner in order to disprove the treatment of Mexicans, Native Americans, and chicanos by white invaders. In essence, the stanza demonstrates that while the new settlers may control la tierra in the eyes of the law, it is the native peoples who will always have the rights to the land in the eyes of a divine, higher calling. On the fifth page of the first chapter, Anzaldua offers a brief history into the original settlement of the Americas, and the subsequent conquest by the Spaniards, as a way to deepen the connection between the natives and their homeland. Another creative decision by the author in order to further her point regarding territorial rights include her use of Spanish, which, in an irony surely not lost on Anzaldúa, has become the native language for the Mexican/chicanos, contrasting the white man’s use of English, who she oftens refers to as “Anglo-terrorists.” Yet my favorite illustration of her commitment occurs within the stanza itself. Anzaldúa makes a clear distinction that the land was Mexican for a period of time, but it was, it is, and it always will be Indian land. Particular emphasis is placed at the end of each line, once, always, is, again, to drive this point home. And while chapter 7 is a call for unity among all mistreated Indians and chicanos, Anzaldúa concedes that the first natives of the land will always have the strongest claim to la frontera.
“This land was Mexican once
Was Indian always
And is
And will be again.” (Anzaldúa)
“The coming together of two self-consistent but habitually incompatible frames of references causes un choque, a cultural collision.” Pg. 100
Identity sits at the front of Anzaldua’s work and narrative, making her voice as both a poetess in “To live in the Borderlands means you,” and author in Borderlands/La Frontera deeply intertwined with her personal experience, opinion, and reason. This quotation encapsulates the depth of her struggle with identity by literally comparing versatile allegiance to a painful accident and imminent damage.
Through this quotation she couples internalized displacement with pairs and groups of contrasting personas. At one point, she alludes to a death of indigenous and Mexican tradition to the brutality of the colonizer. Her metaphor of contrasting pairs of identity thus extends beyond the barriers of a single page, and into her broader argument of identity. Her work shines light on the extended validity of Mexican and Chicanx rights as they represent aspects of indigenous struggle–an identity deeply intertwined in American history yet uprooted in our whitewashed America. The traditional and the rightful stark in contrast to the invasive and deadly. She then encourages a consideration of this traditional identity as it is forced to mold to that of the industrial complex with every new generation, encouraging empathy and demanding change.
There is pain and confusion in her authorship, yet a steely outrage oozing out of the realities of her narrative and experience. Anzaldua quotes El Puma, “North Americans call [the return of Chicanos and Mexicans] to the homeland the silent invasion,” and I wonder how loudly she wants her narrative voice to ring, to contrast the silence, and urge her readers to raise their fists in allegiance with the preservation of identity.
“The Gringo, locked into the fiction of white superiority, seized complete political power, stripping Indians and Mexicans of their lands while their feet were still rooted in it” (p.7).
Gloria Anzaldúa gives us this image of the tyrannical Gringo, obsessed with his own self-worth and quest for complete obedience from those that are supposedly inferior. The white colonists are clearly in the wrong. Anzaldúa makes that clear with a list of the personal and systemic transgressions against the Chicanos. This “fiction of white superiority” must have come from a place of fear. Fear of a different people and different values could have been a powerful motive for the white race to try eradicating the native culture while trying to exploit the labor. I can almost see the fear behind the Gringo’s gaze of hatred and posed confidence.
On page 105, Anzaldúa mentions that her father’s machismo included supporting the family with a strong attitude but letting the love shine through. Anglos warped that meaning and turned it into something different and wrong because they felt “inadequate and inferior and powerless” (p.105) in front of this strong Chicano people. All this adversity hasn’t broken the Chicanos. It surprised me how much faith Anzaldúa has in this group of people that has taken so much hardship. She believes that what’s more important than the image of the white aggressor is the image of the strong, adaptive, multicultural man or woman who lives on the edge but hasn’t given up.
Anzaldúa writes this from the perspective of someone who has seen the hardship herself and lives on the border every day. Living between worlds isn’t easy, and her writing style conveys this well. This is done by sprinkling Spanish words into the English which gives some added perspective to the code switching that so many people go through day to day.
“Soy un amasamiento, I am an act of kneading, of uniting and joining that not only has produced both a creature of darkness and a creature of light, but also a creature that questions the definitions of light and dark and gives them new meanings” (Anzaldúa, 103).
In this quote, Gloria Anzaldúa beautifully describes her identity as a queer mestiza woman working to break down the very walls that define her, borderland dwellers, and people all over the world. Her amasamiento identity, although it creates a great deal of internal distress and questioning, is the very thing that enables her to redefine the light and the dark, the powerful and the not, and the borders drawn by man. As shown many times, borders are unnatural to land and people alike but have been created to elevate those on one side of the border. In Chapter One of her Borderlands, Anzaldúa notes that from Border Field Park, one can see “silver waves marbled with spume // gashing a hold under the border fence” (1) and one the next page she remarks that “the skin of the earth is seamless // The sea cannot be fenced, // el mar does not stop at the borders. // To show the white man what she thought of his // arrogance, // Yemaya blew that wire fence down” (2-3). In this case, the border wall between the countries of Mexico and the United States was created to elevate the white imperialist north of the border. A border between male and female traits was drawn to elevate the male to power in a patriarchal society. The same goes for the border between those who identify as “straight” and those who identify as part of the LGBTQ community, creating a heteronormative culture in many parts of the world.
The mestiza is a byproduct of these manmade borders, be they literal or societal. She walks the line, collecting broken shards of different identities: Chicano, Anglo, Indian, female, male, straight, queer. This combination all kneaded together makes for a lot of identity confusion within the mestiza, a creature of darkness and a creature of light. However do not be mistaken, this amasamiento is a beautiful creature, one who is destined to change the world by questioning the definitions of light and dark and redefining them. She questions the tensions between the white and Chicano, between the female and male, the straight and the queer. She redefines what it means to be a certain race, gender, or sexual orientation thus breaking down borders both geographical and figurative to redistribute power and come home.
“So yes, though ‘home’ permeates every sinew and cartilage in my body, I too am afraid of going home.” Page 21
This deceptively simple line demonstrates an important theme in this text. While Anzaldua respects and honors her cultural identity, she is aware of its flaws and insecure about her place within it.
First, this line speaks to the inherent violence in the history of Latin American and indigenous communities. Anzaldua recounts epidemics of violence, famine, disease and genocide that forged place she calls home. And while she honors her legacy, she notes that she is part conqueror and part victim, and that to deny either one is equally wrong. Her ‘home’, her cultural and personal identity, is a mosaic of all of the good and the evil that has come before her.
Anzaldua also understands that her individuality has isolated herself from her community. In her culture, women are often expected to fulfill a rigidly defined subservient role in the patriarchy. Anyone who resists this destiny faces ostracization. She describes how she was mocked for studying and how her queerness was considered to be “the ultimate rebellion.” This means that her sense of self is indelibly linked to a culture that rejects central tenets of her being.
This line especially resonated with me because I am biracial and because I was raised in Miami, a definitive cultural crossroad. I have seen how the ideals of one culture can conflict with with those of another, and how one can feel intense pressure to walk the tightrope between both. I have also seen how individual traits can be red flags to communities and can label them as outcasts. Many outsiders, both those secure in their own cultures and those that spectate others’, simply wonder why the ‘rebels’ and ‘misfits’ don’t just abandon their culture. But Anzaldua understands that each of us has an individual place in our home, even if that means embracing the paradox of being an outsider within it. Or, in her words her words: “I am a turtle, wherever I go I carry ‘home’ on my back.”
“Soy un amasamiento, I am an act of kneading, of uniting and joining that not only has produced both a creature of darkness and a creature of light, but also a creature that questions the definitions of light and dark and gives them new meanings” (Anzaldua 103).
Upon reading this line for the first time, my mind pictured dough being kneaded, and the many identities Anzaldua possesses mixed together to represent how connected each of her identities are. However, Anzaldua writes that she is “the act of kneading” itself, and by the use of a gerund, Anzaldua highlights she is truly the continuous and ongoing progress that joins her identities together – creating something bigger than herself. She is an action; challenging the exclusive habits of convergent thinking and the rigidness that surrounds identity.
The beginning of the line focuses on her individual “uniting and joining”, but the product that she creates confronts the greater society and provides new meanings for “creatures” like her. The structure is similar to the way Anzaldua writes throughout the whole text, as she often refers to her own personal experience, then speaks openly of any one living in borderlands. With this single line, she captures the intricacy of her own individuality and then further, the power of her intersectionality to push and explore social boundaries. Anzaldua challenges the social proscriptions of the way women should be, of masculinity, of homosexuality, and of a hierarchy of races. By virtue of Anzaldua being a crossroads between multiple cultures, races, languages, and more, she is in a place of inferiority, and also a place of power. She has knowledge of different identities which provides her with versatility and the ability to find common ground with others. As la mestiza, she does not remain within the strict constraints borders attempt to make, but rather is flexible and fluid among all sides. As the embodiment of borderlands, la mestiza approaches and dissects fixed, sociocultural patterns that lie at the foundations of society.
La mestiza holds the connections between cultures, races, sexualities, and languages and demonstrates that she is made of multiple borders. As Anzaldua writes, she weaves her stories, her family’s stories, poetry, and history together which, for the reader, unfolds to become the borderlands itself – a crossroads of her identities. The borderlands lose the simple image of a place for the reader, and become a body, a mind, and/or a soul of someone. My position as a reader is challenged as those who live in the borderlands may or may not physically be living in-between locations. The borderlands are composed internally within people, or individuals create their own borderlands to be in. It challenges me as a reader to explore if I am in borderlands of my own, and the intersections of my own identities as they relate. Anzaldua focuses the grey space that is often ignored by the loudness of the black and white. She resists the idea of a border itself by putting attention on the grey space of the borderlands, and further highlights the complexities and disruption that a border can create.
“And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country-a border culture” (Anzaldúa 3).
I was born and raised in San Diego. So the minute Anzaldúa started describing Border Field Park, the “chainlink fence crowned with rolled barbed wire”, “el llorido del mar, and “el respiro del aire”, I was there. My Dad took me and my sister to Border Field Park once, and we walked along the dirt road trail to the beach, to the American side of the fence. The beach on the American side was empty. I remember putting my feet in the cold water and watching a few seagulls roaming nearby. The Mexican side, on the other hand, was full of life, of dogs and families with umbrellas and picnics. I remember thinking it so odd how the border fence just ended in the ocean, how it seemed like anyone could just swim around it. It barely felt like we were at the border of two different countries. Then we went to the border fence, which has holes so tiny so the families chatting on either side of the fence can’t pass money through it. And then we went home, to our home in affluent northern San Diego.
I found this line really interesting because of its description of the border culture as a scab, the product of “una herida abierta”, the unnatural boundary metal boundary that stretches into a rippling and uncontrollable sea. The border culture, according to Anzaldúa, is a land of confusion, of two cultures becoming one, and is a land avoided by most. Its inhabitants are the “prohibited and forbidden”, considered by gringos to be “transgressors, aliens…”. It’s certainly true in San Diego. There was a reason I didn’t see any gringo San Diegan families having picnics by that metal fence. Most San Diegans, or at least those with no ties to Mexico, pretend the border doesn’t exist, pretend the open wound created by it doesn’t affect our lives and the lives of everyone around us every day. While San Diego’s undocumented immigrants are often exploited due to fear of deportation and San Diego has one of the biggest human trafficking problems in this nation (Anzaldúa focuses on the trafficking of Mexican women later in this chapter), the shared fear of the borderland and the people that come through it squashes those facts. Instead, San Diego is always advertised as a sunny land of gringo surfers and palm trees with absolutely no scabs from the metal barrier that stretches into the sea.
Anzaldúa’s metaphor of the creation of a border culture as a scab sets up the theme for the rest of her commentary. The reader will most likely think of scabs as undesirable and/or disgusting, and this image placed into the reader’s head works well as Anzaldúa goes on to explain how this opinion causes the borderlands to be ignored and/or feared by many Americans.
“The new mestiza copes by developing a tolerance for contradictions, a tolerance for ambiguity” (Anzaldúa 101).
Anzaldúa speaks of “contradiction” and “ambiguity” and in doing so invokes an extended metaphor of the mestiza’s identity as a geographical border. A border, while a clear geopolitical line that divides two countries, is often the epicenter of cultural mixing and civil ambiguity, as Anzaldúa asserts throughout her writing in her descriptions of growing up in the Borderlands. Instead of a uniform culture and set of values that exists deep in a country’s homogenous heartland, the towns and people living along a border don’t hold values that are exist around a common national or racial identity. The mestizo/a claim multiracial and multinational identities that are often “split” in their psyches, similar to how a border clearly divides two countries.
In a later chapter, Anzaldúa states that the struggle of humans “has always been inner” and that is often “played out in the outer terrains.” This suggests there exists a relationship between the mestizo and the border in which each reinforce each other. The various, distinct mental psyches of the mestizos “played out” into the creating of border towns and confusing environments that hold no clear national or racial identity; mestizos created physical towns with houses and fences and walls that match their own “split” inner psyches. At the same time, however, it is the existence of the Borderlands and the geopolitical border itself that enforces the “split” mindset and the mental walking of the border between two countries that many mestizos experience. This contradictory relationship between mental and physical perhaps exists solely because of the “tolerance for contradictions” that Anzaldúa claims of the new mestiza.
Is the mestiza is someone to pity or someone to celebrate? Speaking as someone with a Mexican father and a white mother, I would say both, and Anzaldúa’s writings suggest that she would agree. I believe that it’s almost impossible to be fully and equally immersed in one’s two cultures; one will inevitably belong to one culture more than the other, which will cause the her pain as she experiences guilt over disconnect with one culture and frustration with her lack of perfect assimilation into the other. Ambivalence is the only solution, as Anzaldúa claims, stating that an inability to flexible can be devastating. But the mestiza should also be celebrated. Anzaldúa suggests that with the mestiza’s new tolerance for contradiction and ambiguity, she is the future in an increasingly connected world and her split mind has the ability to end the world conflict. And I would agree; flexibility in thought and tolerance for contradiction and complication are necessary qualities in whichever minds are put to solve the world’s greatest issues, and in this, a mestiza can thrive.
“1,950 mile-long open wound dividing a pueblo, a culture, running down the length of my body, staking fence rods in my flesh”
After reading through the excerpts from Anzaldua’s piece, this line struck me as especially important to the piece as a whole because it demonstrates the struggle of the Chicano in accepting physical, cultural, and emotional chance. The stark imagery used in this line of the “1,950 mile-long open wound” creates a gruesome image of destruction and pain, but in reality this image refers to the border between the U.S. and Mexico, which is seemingly harmless. On the contrary, Anzaldua shows how a line drawn on a map can create immense division. On the physical level, she describes how a “pueblo”, or town, was literally divided leaving people on both sides of the border. Likewise, this border divides “a culture” by creating uncertainty within the indigenous people because their land is now a white colonists. The indigenous people suffered this “open wound” in a battle they did not want to fight, and now they are divided by the decision to conform or rebel. By describing the wound as “running down the length of [her own] body”, Anzaldua makes the pain felt by all Chicanos personal. It is as though the “wound” splits her two identities, Mexican and American. The border or “wound” thus takes away the autonomy of the individual in this situation because one is expected to follow a certain set of cultural norms or rules depending on which side of the border they fall on. Similarly, the border causes Chicanos to battle internally with what it means to be mixed-race. Anzaldua describes how the border is like “staking fence rods into [her own] flesh” because just as it divides two countries it all divides her. It is as though half her body were pinned to either side of the border, unable to escape to one side stuck in an infinite state of liminality trying to choose to which side you belong.
To survive the Borderlands
you must live sin fronteras
be a crossroads.
– Page 119 To Live in the Borderlands Means You
After reading Anzaldua’s work I find myself choosing this excerpt from her poem To Live in the Borderlands Means You. I have spent my entire life living between cultures. I was raised in both Jewish and Christian faiths, having to be open to two different cultures of religion. At the age of thirteen I moved from Boston, Massachusetts to a tiny island off the coast of southern Georgia. At first I found it difficult to relate to people because of how different they were. Over time I began to understand that although many of their views on faith, politics and culture dramatically opposed my own, I could either choose to focus on our differences or try and see the good that each individual had to offer.
Anzaldua’s message in this stanza encapsulates the overlying message of her entire work. In order to survive an experience in the Borderlands, one must be open to everything and everyone they encounter. The paradox found in this sentence shows the reader how the Mestiza exist, living on a border yet having no borders within themselves. Everyone in this seminar can relate on a deep and personal level to this excerpt. We have all spent a great deal of time in between the border of high school and college. In this time, just as Gloria Anzaldua, we face the challenges of not belonging, being torn between different lives.
Anzaldua uses the word survive to show her readers how difficult it is to reside in a Borderland. No one can live fulfilled in this alien world we call a Borderland. One’s purpose is stripped away, leaving an unclear path clouded with uncertainty and fear. This excerpt ends the poem, To Live in the Borderlands Means You, yet begins the journey of the Mestiza way of life which is vitally important to Anzaldua and her people. They are a “crossroad” between many different cultures that lead to a new species, a new consciousness.
Just as the excerpt I chose ends Anzalduas poem, it prefaces the next two chapters that we were assigned to read. I find this interesting because as we “Febs” start to see the end of our Febmester, we must cross the border into the college world and reinvent ourselves into something new, something without borders.
“I stand at the edge where earth touches ocean/where the two overlap/a gentle coming together/at other times and places a violent clash” (Anzaldua 1).
Instantly, Anzaldua alludes to the conflict of a borderland — in this case, between water and earth — as entirely natural. Upon reading this line, I felt discomfort and a tinge of hopelessness. If the “violent clash” of a border is natural, how can we as humans expect to overcome it? But that is why this line is integral to the soul of Anzaldua’s work; A border can also be a “gentle coming together,” quiet and soft. On page three, she contradicts the message above: “But the skin of the earth is seamless./The sea cannot be fenced,/ el mar does not stop at borders.” She begins to chip away at one’s assumption that when two massive forces come together it must always be a collision. Instead, she challenges us to think of the border as forever shifting, never stagnant, and “in a constant state of transition” (3).
And what of the organisms who live beyond the border? At first glance, the earth and ocean as two very different habitats. Clearly, the things that thrive in one do not in the other. But as I continued to read Anzaldua’s work, it struck me that although this may be true, we are all still made of the same material and require the same things to live. On page 111, she even describes a small bird in a tree over a river as fishlike, as if the two creatures were a reflection of one another. In the context of Borderlands, this encompasses the situation at the United States and Mexican border. Mexico relies heavily on United States industry, and thus Americans rely on Mexican workers. Like the bird eats the fish, and the fish nourishes the bird, the two countries are dependent on one another. How can we expect the border to separate those who rely upon one another? Even her use of Spanish throughout the text encompasses a similar idea. To a bilingual reader, who can straddle the borderland, it is easy to follow the text. But to some, the shift between language can be jarring. When she inserts a Spanish word or phrase, it feels like the gentle wave overlapping the shore. But when a paragraph or an excerpt is entirely in Spanish, it can be a violent clash. Both languages support her thesis. Both nurture one another. But it is the reader’s perspective that cast them as dependent or independent.
The borderlands is a place of erosion. Like a river eats into a canyon, it will always shift into a new era, perhaps of freedom or ownership. Both the earth and sea were used as a vessel for the many invasions that Anzaldua describes over time. We may perceive the act of crossing from the water into land as stepping over a border, an intrusion. Or we can see that standing at the ocean’s edge is to be connected to the entirety of the world. To transcend the borderland mentality is to think of the water and the earth as a single being instead of casting them in duality. If we did this as people, we discover a “hybrid progeny, a mutable, more malleable species” (99). This transition is natural. The concept and destruction of the borderlands are both natural. To stand “at the edge where earth touches ocean” is to be united in both worlds, like Anzaldua herself.
“Indigenous like corn, like corn, the mestiza is a product of crossbreeding, designed for preservation under a variety of conditions.” (Anzaldua 103)
After having read the poem and the chapter excerpts, I found myself drawn to this simple simile as a descriptive tool in the painting of the picture that is the struggle for identity, and the nature of the mestiza. Although she only clearly states their relationship as a shared past in crossbreeding, or lack of a true origin, Anzaldua leaves a world of meaning to be discovered by the reader.
Corn, the cultivation of corn, global reliance on corn, each piece of the context which surrounds such a mundane crop helps to bring the true nature of Anzaldua’s struggle to light. Corn is universal, corn is eternal, corn is a by-product of centuries of intense refinement and evaluation, but most importantly in Anzaldua’s use of the metaphor, corn knows few boundaries. Corn is bound only by geography, yet politically corn is untouched by historical development and global movements. In relating the mestiza struggle for identity and appreciation to corn, Anzaldua describes her movement as global, everlasting, and without care for the complaint of those who seek to quell her revolution.
In continuation, corn and maize products are capable of taking many forms, and in this way Anzaldua accentuates the diversity of her movement. In later excerpts, she explains how her affiliation with the queer and feminist movements have brought her into circles unknown to those choosing not to take part in these movements, how in avoidance of and opposition to the institution of intolerance, she has found herself a part of a community of great diversity, resilience, progressiveness. This community finds roots all across the world, made up of those who feel themselves “outcasts”. And although corn is not considered to be an “outcast” of a crop, its ability to be altered, rendered, and manipulated is incredible, and the ability for all these different products and items to be grouped in the same category is greater still. By relating her movement to corn, Anzaldua insinuates that her struggle is one of a universal and diverse nature.
Anzaldua’s use of a simile, to relate her kind and her struggle to corn, describes them both as universal, progressive, diverse, and everchanging.
“La Mestiza has gone from being the sacrificial goat to becoming the officiating priestess at the crossroads” (Anzaldúa 102).
This excerpt from Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands, La Frontera embodies what it means to be La Mestiza in her eyes, and how La Mestiza has been transformed from a sort of social pariah, into a bridge between cultures. This is why I was drawn to this specific excerpt. Anzaldúa’s use of metaphor illustrates the shift in the role of La Mestiza in a beautiful way that allows the reader to become more deeply acquainted with the position La Mestiza finds herself in. The sacrificial goat is commonly used to reference a sacrifice that must be made for the common good, in this case the bridging of two cultures. This allusion highlights how Anzaldúa, and the broader La Mestiza, is forced to sacrifice parts of herself and her identity to fit into cultural constraints or to sacrifice her safety net of a home to exist in the spaces between her two cultures, risking exclusion from both. Yet, La Mestiza has shifted from the sacrificial goat to the officiating priestess in the eyes of Anzaldúa, so what does this mean for La Mestiza? This is not a shift of La Mestiza’s position externally, but rather a shift in her internal view of her position. In the following paragraph Anzaldúa further explains, “as a mestiza I have no country, my homeland cast me out; yet all countries are mine because I am every woman’s sister or potential lover.” This realization of the true power La Mestiza possesses as a bridge between cultures is what transforms her from a sacrifice to an officiating priestess.
This line is essential to the development of the reader’s understanding of La Mestiza and therefore plays an important role in the chapter as a whole. This line is able to deepen the reader’s connection with Anzaldúa in order to more intimately understand La Mestiza. It reveals both the struggles she faces and the way she uses them to build strength and find a unique identity that exists at the crossroads.
“As refugees in a homeland that does not want them, many find a welcome hand holding out only suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” – Page 12
The irony and paradox employed in this powerful sentence from chapter one of Gloria Anzaldua’s Borderlands/La Frontera provide an insightful glimpse into the complex suffering of Mexican immigrants in America.
Anzaldua’s decision to refer to America as “a homeland” for Mexican immigrants is a clear example of an ironic paradox. “Homeland,” here, is a term clearly rooted in truth, however, the reality for these immigrants is quite obviously the opposite. I chose this sentence because of how it elucidates why I might feel sympathetic and guilty about the history of these Tejanos and their current disposition. She uses the same technique as she depicts “a welcome hand holding out only suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” Clearly the opposite of welcoming, Anzaldua’s ironic and paradoxical description of what awaits successful immigrants drives home the central idea of the first chapter: the “Anglos’” disregard for the land, welfare, and integrity of native Tejanos has resulted in generations of oppression, poverty, and helplessness for many Mexican citizens.
Anzaldua employs paradox and contradiction in a more subtle manner by illustrating the fact that there is no clear decision Mexican citizens can make for a more prosperous or fair way of life. Her bleak depiction of successful immigrants’ unfortunate position comes directly after her description of the perils inherent to their illegal journey across the Mexican-American border. As Anzaldua states, Mexicans who successfully emigrate to America are met with “suffering, pain, and ignoble death.” The decision by Mexican immigrants to merely make this journey, juxtaposed with Anzaldua’s description of what awaits them if they are successful, is paradoxical and gives the reader a clear understanding of the extremely unfavorable disposition Mexican citizens are born into.
“splits me splits me
me raja me raja” – page 2, Borderlands/La Frontera
After re-reading both chapters of Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Fronter as well as her poem To Live In The Borderlands, I found myself repeatedly coming back to this short, simple line. By itself, it is just another line in what is otherwise a great read. However, in the context of the entire piece, I believe it is extremely powerful and highlights an important message.
Every author, every writer, every artist, every musician, and every poet has their own unique style that allows them to stand out from the rest – be it their cadence, their artistic vision, their rhyming patterns, their storytelling techniques, and so on. With Gloria Anzaldúa’s work, the first thing I had noticed was how much of herself she pours into her work. This gives her work a sense of identity that is unique and unparalleled. Despite her works being predominantly in English, she manages to stay true to her Chicana roots. This can be seen as many lines in her work are either partly or completely in Spanish. For example, she switches back and forth from English to Spanish in describing people and various groups (‘los Norteamericanos’, ‘Tejanos’, and ‘la Migra’ are but a few examples).
In a way, this serves as an extended metaphor for Anzaldúa’s own identity; although she is listed on many websites as an American scholar, through her work she constantly reminds us of her Mexican origin. As a reader, this invites us to embrace her not for what she appears to be on the outside, but for who she is at her core. It also implores us to reflect on ourselves as individuals; do we simply accept ourselves for the nationality listed on our passport, the cultural identity of our parents, the environment that we grew up in, or something else entirely? This speaks to me on a very personal level. Despite legally being an American, my family and my roots are entirely Bangladeshi. Growing up in international schools in 3 different countries, I found myself questioning and even running away from my identity multiple times when I was younger. However, as I have grown older I now see it as something not just to accept, but something to be proud of. Thus, Anzaldúa’s work and, specifically in the lines chosen, her choice of repeating herself in Spanish speaks to me on a personal level and draws me to the idea of embracing one’s cultural identity, despite tangible obstructions such as borders and intangible ones alike.
Going back to the original lines aforementioned, I strongly believe everything from her word choice to the placement of the words themselves were intentional; she chose to ‘split’ those two lines in that particular way (the same way she herself is being ‘split’) and for the following lines to be in Spanish. ‘Me raja’ translated to English means ‘I crack’, and serves as both a reminder of Anzaldúa’s origins as well as another powerful way for her to portray the impact of the border on herself. When she writes ‘splits me’, she means all parts of her; her body, her culture, and her soul.
As a reader, I believe this challenges our position and what to expect from Anzaldúa’s work in every single way. Through her unique storytelling methods, the abundance of Spanish vocabulary seamlessly mixed into an English text, her personification of the objects around her, as well as a plethora of visual imagery, Gloria Anzaldúa provides us with a text that is fundamental not only to ‘border texts’, but to cultural and literary texts as a whole, and forces us to challenge our presumptions on borders and identity. What’s more, all of this is brilliantly portrayed in but 1 simple line.
“She learns to transform the small ‘I’ into the total Self” — page 104
I was drawn to this quote because I believe it encapsulates the core of the mestiza consciousness; taking ownership of our conflicting narratives to create an empowered sense of self, one that is not only a fuller individual, but also part of a broader togetherness. To achieve this, we must collect the many pieces that form our identity and embrace their differences, trusting it will lead to our evolution. This idea of bringing together opposites and stirring understanding through empathy is core to Anzaldua’s philosophy. Not only does she write about why we should adhere to her new consciousness, but she also uses her writing as a medium that embodies these beliefs.
Her writing in several ways incorporates the multitudes of her experiences and ancestry, combining elements of Aztec folklore with Catholic prayers, Afro Latino creeds with indigenous philosophies, her white cultural capital and her Chicana identity. In “El camino de la mestiza/The Mestiza Way” (page 104), for example, she alludes to the Tolteca philosophy of creating a harmonious relationship with the self at the same time as she disposes of her American persona’s elements—the ‘muni-bart metromaps’ and her dollars. More notably, she introduces the Aztec legend of the Eagle and the Serpent first as a starting point for a critique of the patriarchy (page 5), but then uses it as an extended analogy to how the mestiza doesn’t pick sides, but rather combines them. Finally, by writing bilingually as well as using a broad range of specific cultural references, Anzaldua persuades the reader to seek a deeper understanding of her reality, one that does not exclude or hides her borderland identity, and, thus, has them empathize with her worldview. Indeed, her writing aims to teach the reader how to transform their singular experiences into an intersection, a crossroads, where they can, too, create a new multifaceted identity.