Good Indian, bad Indian

The picture above is by Siqueros, one of Mexico's greatest muralists, alongside Orozco and Rivera. I actually saw this mural. Some of this posts other pictures were not taken by me though.

(Note, I didn't put this when it happened, but at this point I do not care. My composition class is over now, but I'll mention a few more stories from it probably)

As my Spanish class with Rosalva was one-on-one, we got into some odd conversations. We read a piece in the textbook (for our reportage unit) on one indigenous Mexican town's "Dance of the Conquest," unusual in its portrayal of Malinche as a heroine (people in the town claim her as one of their own).

We got onto the subject of one of America's Malinches: Pocahontas. Rosalva said that in America we love Indians only to bury them (also referring to the portrayal in Dances with Wolves). I asked her whether it was true in Mexico as well. She said "yes." It's funny how the whole "good indian" v. "Bad Indian" thing works out, at least in "traditional" histories (just as racist in both countries perhaps, but still interesting, things are beginning to change in both countries). Here's the U.S.A.'s "Good Indians":

here's our "Bad Indians" :

I realize this is starting to change, with the current work on the Crazy-Horse monument. The 19th century view is still alive to some people though. What we put on pedastals does not necessarily jive with our present-day reality. It's more our version of where we came from and what we choose to define as "national."

Anyways in mainstream Mexican History, it's just as racist...

Good Indians:

(The statues were taken by me, the other one of Cuahtemoc, I got from a web search.

Bad Indian:

That last one was Malinche, Cortez's translator and mistress. She's also in that first picture, but I couldn't blow it up big enough to accurately show her making out with a suit of armor. Oficially she's considered the reason for the downfall of the Aztec Empire. Rosalva said that it was just another myth like Cleopatra or Eve, that was intended to put women down. She claimed some Meztisos (mixed-race Mexicans, the majority of the country) hate her because they blame her for creating the Meztiso race ("Hijos de la Malinche"). They'd rather be 100% Spanish.

As for Rosalva's opinion, she sees her as a curious victim caught up in Cortez's plan.

I'm not sure I agree with her version or the old version. The fact is that many nations in what is now Mexico were tired of paying tribute to the Aztecs and thought the Spanish were there to help them (they were wrong, the conquistadors demanded more). Rosalva gets offended though when people insult pre-Collumbian nations (she has problems with Apocalypto too).

As far as present-day Mexico goes, Rosalva's statement that I pass for an upper-class Mexican probably says something about the current upper-class. I've found people who look like me more at the top of the hill than at the bottom (upper and lower are literal here in Cuernavaca) I'll get to my environmental racism observations later (or seeing how this blog is going, "earlier").