Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza
Written on Sep 09, 2007 // Feminismos, Libros, Mexico.Sólo un pequeño homenaje a la inmensa obra de Gloria Anzaldúa.
Because I, a mestiza,
continually walk ouu of one culture
and into another,
because I am in all cultures at the same time,
alma entre dos mundos, tres, cuatro,
me zumba la cabeza con lo contradictorio.
Estoy norteada por todas la voces que me hablan
simultáneamente.
“La conciencia de la mestiza: una lucha de fronteras / A Struggle of Borders.”
I was the first in six generations to leave the Valley, the only one in my family to ever leave home. But I didn´t leave all the parts of me: I kept the ground of my own being. On it I walked away, taking with me the land, the Valley, Texas. Gané mi camino y me largué. Muy andariega mi hija. Because I left of my own accord me dicen, “¿Cómo te gusta la mala vida?”
“Movimientos de rebeldía y las culturas que traicionan.”
The first time I heard two women, a Puerto Rican and a Cuban, say the word “nosotras”, I was shocked. I had not known the word existed. Chicanas use “nosotros” whether we´re male or female. We are robbed of our female being by the masculine plural. Language is a male discourse. (…) Even our own people, other Spanish speakers nos quieren poner candados en la boca. They would hold us back with their bag of reglas de academia.
“How to Tame a Wild Tongue.”
Selección de Anzaldúa, Gloria (1987) Borderlands / La frontera: The New Mestiza. San Francisco, Spinsters/Aunt Lute.
