Border Culture

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Recommended: immigration expressed through music

Traditions are passed on generation to generation in every culture. The U.S-Mexico border consists of numerous customs that have lived for hundreds of years. This essay examines Jose’ Pablo Villalobos and Juan Carlos Ramirez-Pimiento essay “Corridos and la pura verdad: Myths and Realities of the Mexican Ballad” which discusses the corrido. Chapter six, “Everyday Border Heroes” of Patricia L. Price’s book Dry Place which illustrates the reasons to the devotion to unofficial saints. Futhermore, this essay reviews five of the twenty myths that Aviva Chomsky confronts in her book “They Take Our Jobs!”. In the essay “Corridos and la pura verdad: Myths and Realities of the Mexican Ballad, Villalobos and Ramirez-Pimiento discuss the Mexican Corrido, the issues it relates to, and its relevance to the border culture. The issues the corrido relates to involve the question as to whether the descriptive verses in the ballads are factual or fictional. The corrido is relevant to the border culture because many of the subjects are drug traffickers that are regarded as heroes. Villalobos and Ramirez-Pimiento explain that “The MEXICAN, CORRIDO, or ballad, has been popularly portrayed as a cultural form that registers events and subjects that state-controlled records do not” (Villalobos, 129). Many people question whether these events are being recorded in history books and state controlled records accurately. As an example the authors recount the story of Hector Felix Miranda also known as “El ‘Gato’ Felix” (Villalobos, 133). According to the prohibited corrido by Enrique Franco, Hector was killed in “…in a mere attempt at silencing the voice of the people…” (Villalobos, 131-132). The second corrido the authors discuss is the narcocorr... ... middle of paper ... ... the fact that “although only 10 percent of what an average immigrant earns here, the money sent home represents 50 percent to 80 percent of the household income for those at home in Latin America. Ninety percent of immigrants’ wages are spent in this country” (Chomsky, 46). Chomsky is able to refute the five myths that are expressed in the book by finding holes in the arguments for those myths and giving examples how the contrary is true as far as the relation of immigrants and the economy. The Corrido, devotion to saints and immigration all thrive on the U.S.-Mexico border. The Corrido reminds each generation that they have a voice. Loyalty to unofficial saints provides each generation a sense of hope that circumstances will go their way. In addition, exposing the myths of immigration may offer the next generation a chance for a better way of life.

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