essay
The anthropology and sociology of the Mexican-Americans: the distortion of Mexican-American history
Voices ; readings from El Grito, a journal of contemporary Mexican American thought, 1967-1971 • Berkeley, Calif. • Published In 1971 • Pages: 26-39
By: Romano-V., Octavio Ignacio.
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
This essay is a critique of the books by William Madsen, Ruth Tuck, Lyle Sunders, Munro Edmonson, Rockwood Kluckhohn, Fred L. Strodbeck, Celia S. Heller, Julian Samora, and Richard A. Lamanna, for their prejudicial and racist depiction of the Mexican-American national character, and traditional culture. The author states that the views of Mexican-Americans as expressed in the works listed above '…are precisely those held by people during the days of the American frontier. In short, there has not been any significant change in views toward Mexican-Americans for the past 100 years….What we have, instead, are contemporary social scientists busily perpetuating the very same opinions of Mexican culture that were current during the Mexican-American War. These opinions were, and are, pernicious, vicious, misleading, degrading, and brainwashing in that they obliterate history and then re-write it in such a way as to eliminate the historical significance of Mexican-Americans, as well as to simultaneously question the legitimacy of their presence in contemporary society' (p. 37).
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Reviews and critiques
- Ethos
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Chicanos
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 2002
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- North America
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Regional, Ethnic and Diaspora Cultures
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- essay
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Ethnologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 4: Excellent Secondary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- John Beierle ; 2001
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- no date
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 1880s - mid twentieth century
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- United States
- NotesAdditional notes
- Octavio Ignacio Romano-V.
- Includes bibliographical references (p. 39)
- LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
- 79168569
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Mexican Americans