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[Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza] [By: Anzaldúa, Gloria] [June, 2012]
Named one of the “Best Books of 1987” by Library Journal
Selected by Utne Reader as part of its “Alternative Canon” in 1998
One of Hungry Mind Review's “Best 100 Books of the 20th Century”
Rooted in Gloria Anzaldúa’s experience as a Chicana, a lesbian, an activist, and a writer, the essays and poems in this volume profoundly challenged, and continue to challenge, how we think about identity. Borderlands/La Frontera remaps our understanding of what a “border” is, presenting it not as a simple divide between here and there, us and them, but as a psychic, social, and cultural terrain that we inhabit, and that inhabits all of us. This edition, coming March 1, 2022, will be a more condensed edition, containing only the original text from 1987, and will be at a more accessible price point for readers. For those looking for a scholarly context to this crucial work, the Critical Edition is currently available.
The emotional and intellectual impact of the book is disorienting and powerful…all languages are spoken, and survival depends on understanding all modes of thought. In the borderlands new creatures come into being. Anzaldúa celebrates this "new mestiza" in bold, experimental writing. — The Village Voice
Anzaldúa's pulsating weaving of innovative poetry with sparse informative prose brings us deep into the insider/outsider consciousness of the borderlands; that ancient and contemporary, crashing and blending world that divides and unites America. — Women’s Review of Books
Selected by Utne Reader as part of its “Alternative Canon” in 1998
One of Hungry Mind Review's “Best 100 Books of the 20th Century”
Rooted in Gloria Anzaldúa’s experience as a Chicana, a lesbian, an activist, and a writer, the essays and poems in this volume profoundly challenged, and continue to challenge, how we think about identity. Borderlands/La Frontera remaps our understanding of what a “border” is, presenting it not as a simple divide between here and there, us and them, but as a psychic, social, and cultural terrain that we inhabit, and that inhabits all of us. This edition, coming March 1, 2022, will be a more condensed edition, containing only the original text from 1987, and will be at a more accessible price point for readers. For those looking for a scholarly context to this crucial work, the Critical Edition is currently available.
The emotional and intellectual impact of the book is disorienting and powerful…all languages are spoken, and survival depends on understanding all modes of thought. In the borderlands new creatures come into being. Anzaldúa celebrates this "new mestiza" in bold, experimental writing. — The Village Voice
Anzaldúa's pulsating weaving of innovative poetry with sparse informative prose brings us deep into the insider/outsider consciousness of the borderlands; that ancient and contemporary, crashing and blending world that divides and unites America. — Women’s Review of Books
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First published January 1, 1987
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About the author
Gloria E. Anzaldúa
43 books781 followersGloria E. Anzaldúa was a scholar of Chicana cultural theory, feminist theory, and queer theory. She loosely based her best-known book, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza, on her life growing up on the Mexican-Texas border and incorporated her lifelong feelings of social and cultural marginalization into her work.
When she was eleven, her family relocated to Hargill, Texas. Despite feeling discriminated against as a sixth-generation Tejana and as a female, and despite the death of her father from a car accident when she was fourteen, Anzaldúa still obtained her college education. In 1968, she received a B.A. in English, Art, and Secondary Education from Pan American University, and an M.A. in English and Education from the University of Texas at Austin. While in Austin, she joined politically active cultural poets and radical dramatists such as Ricardo Sanchez, and Hedwig Gorski.
After obtaining a Bachelor of Arts in English from the then Pan American University (now University of Texas-Pan American), Anzaldúa worked as a preschool and special education teacher. In 1977, she moved to California, where she supported herself through her writing, lectures, and occasional teaching stints about feminism, Chicano studies, and creative writing at San Francisco State University, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Florida Atlantic University, among other universities.
(from Wikipedia)
See also: https://tshaonline.org/handbook/onlin...
When she was eleven, her family relocated to Hargill, Texas. Despite feeling discriminated against as a sixth-generation Tejana and as a female, and despite the death of her father from a car accident when she was fourteen, Anzaldúa still obtained her college education. In 1968, she received a B.A. in English, Art, and Secondary Education from Pan American University, and an M.A. in English and Education from the University of Texas at Austin. While in Austin, she joined politically active cultural poets and radical dramatists such as Ricardo Sanchez, and Hedwig Gorski.
After obtaining a Bachelor of Arts in English from the then Pan American University (now University of Texas-Pan American), Anzaldúa worked as a preschool and special education teacher. In 1977, she moved to California, where she supported herself through her writing, lectures, and occasional teaching stints about feminism, Chicano studies, and creative writing at San Francisco State University, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Florida Atlantic University, among other universities.
(from Wikipedia)
See also: https://tshaonline.org/handbook/onlin...
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October 18, 2015
Anzaldúa’s most famous work, a collection of essays and poetry is a refreshing and important book. I read this for my Chicana literature course and it is by far the touchstone of Chicana studies. Anzaldúa writes very personal but powerful essays on what it means to be Chicana and what it’s like living in a country in which she is seen as a second or third class citizen. Her poetry is political but highly readable and perfectly complements the essays in this collection. I highly recommend this work, even if you have no interest in Chicano studies, it’s required reading.
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December 4, 2013“Culture is made by those in power- men. Males make the rules and laws; women transmit them.” - Anzaldua, 16
This is really a great book that I will surely go back to over and over. There is a certain point that i find revolutionary and inspiring to me in this text. In the second chapter, Anzaldua navigates her position between a patriarchal culture and the white man’s violence. At page 22, Anzaldua mentions ‘sisters’ who glorify colored cultures to “offset the extreme devaluation of it by white culture.”
I personally struggle with navigating my position as an Arab woman who shares the same academic space with white culture. Before coming to the US, I have never met the white other and felt much comfortable criticizing and confronting the sexism, racism, and homophobia of my own culture. Such criticism, in an American space, becomes material for war propaganda, a way to patronize Arab women and use them as victims/weapons. It turns into some Islamophobic material. Feminists of color have been debating this question for years now; how can we have critiques of our cultures/communities when we are vulnerable to the white man’s gaze. Navigating our positions between two axes of oppression is a very difficult task that might be presented in a text like Borderlands, but does not seem feasible to me in everyday life. In Borderlands, Anzaldua sets up the path with her first chapter detailing a history of violence practiced by the white man against her people. Then she goes off to debate her homo/sexuality as a tool to challenge one’s culture. This shift between the two parts states an important point; that both cultures are patriarchal and have done violence to women’s bodies. Yet, women need to navigate between the two settings to protect the ‘self.’
This is really a great book that I will surely go back to over and over. There is a certain point that i find revolutionary and inspiring to me in this text. In the second chapter, Anzaldua navigates her position between a patriarchal culture and the white man’s violence. At page 22, Anzaldua mentions ‘sisters’ who glorify colored cultures to “offset the extreme devaluation of it by white culture.”
I personally struggle with navigating my position as an Arab woman who shares the same academic space with white culture. Before coming to the US, I have never met the white other and felt much comfortable criticizing and confronting the sexism, racism, and homophobia of my own culture. Such criticism, in an American space, becomes material for war propaganda, a way to patronize Arab women and use them as victims/weapons. It turns into some Islamophobic material. Feminists of color have been debating this question for years now; how can we have critiques of our cultures/communities when we are vulnerable to the white man’s gaze. Navigating our positions between two axes of oppression is a very difficult task that might be presented in a text like Borderlands, but does not seem feasible to me in everyday life. In Borderlands, Anzaldua sets up the path with her first chapter detailing a history of violence practiced by the white man against her people. Then she goes off to debate her homo/sexuality as a tool to challenge one’s culture. This shift between the two parts states an important point; that both cultures are patriarchal and have done violence to women’s bodies. Yet, women need to navigate between the two settings to protect the ‘self.’
December 12, 2025
The border between the U.S. state of Texas and the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Nuevo León, Coahuila, and Chihuahua is a culturally rich and fascinating place. Two great nations meet along that border, in the context of an often-difficult shared history. I have thought about the history and culture of the border region at the border crossings I have visited – Brownsville/Matamoros, Progreso/Nuevo Progreso, Laredo/Nuevo Laredo, and El Paso/Ciudad Juárez – and my interest in the region has been renewed by my reading of Gloria Anzaldúa’s 1987 book Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza.
Anzaldúa was originally from Harlingen, Texas, and in the first section of Borderlands/La Frontera, which is titled “Atravesando Fronteras/Crossing Borders,” she provides a narrative and essayistic look at the different factors from her life that nourished her writing and scholarship. As a Mexican American raised on the U.S. side of the border, she describes facing discrimination from Anglo-Americans in Texas, and from Mexicans of Mexico who felt that, as a Mexican American, she was somehow not as “pure” in her Mexican identity as they were. She describes the challenges of reconciling her pride in Mexico’s pre-Christian religious and cultural past with the devout Catholicism of present-day Mexico. And, as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, she knows that her sexual orientation puts her at odds with the strongly traditionalist gender norms and expectations of Mexico’s patriarchal society. All these factors seem to have nourished her interest in the idea of borders generally.
In one chapter that is titled “La herencia de Coatlicue/The Coatlicue State,” Anzaldúa invokes the Aztec mother goddess Coatlicue who gave birth to the sun, the moon, and the stars. She connects Coatlicue and other Aztec deities with the Virgin of Guadalupe, “the single most potent religious, political, and cultural image of the Chicano/mexicano” (p. 30), stating, in reflections that sometimes sound rather like the work of U.S. Transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau, that
I’ve always been aware that there is a greater power than the conscious I. That power is my inner self, the entity that is the sum total of all my reincarnations, the godwoman in me I call Antigua, mi Diosa, the divine within, Coatlicue-Cihuacoatl-Tlazolteotl-Tonantzin-Coatlalopeuh-Guadalupe – they are one. When to bow down to Her and when to allow the limited conscious mind to take over – that is the problem. (p. 50)
I have visited the great cathedral at Guadalupe where the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared to an Indigenous Mexican farmer named Juan Diego in 1531. I have seen the sacred image behind the altar (one can view it from a moving walkway behind the altar, even while Masses are in progress). Perhaps I am drawn to this book because of my memories of visiting Guadalupe; perhaps it is that I am posting this review on the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a national holiday in Mexico. But whatever the case may be, I found this part of Anzaldúa’s book particularly bold.
After all, linking La Virgen de Guadalupe with motherhood goddesses like Coatlicue, Tonantzin and Cihuacoatl might not be all that surprising. But associating her with Tlazolteotl, the Aztec goddess of sex, desire, and lust? No doubt that raised some eyebrows on both sides of the border. Anzaldúa is certainly fearless in setting forth her non-traditional outlook on her society.
The second half of Borderlands/La Frontera is titled Un Agitato Viento/Ehécatl, The Wind,” and it provides a variety of poems and passages of short fiction that re-emphasize the ideas of the autobiography, essays, and nonfiction of the first section.
One work from this section of the book that stood out for me was “Cervicide,” a short story about a young girl named Prieta. The story focuses on Prieta’s love for “La venadita”, or “The small fawn” that she and her family found the day it was born, after its mother had been shot by a hunter. Prieta has raised the fawn, with deep love, ever since; but a crisis unfolds when a game warden, with his hounds, closes in on the house. It is illegal, under Texas law, to keep a deer in one’s household, and the narrator faces the prospect of having to kill her beloved pet; otherwise, she is told, “The game warden would put su papí en la cárcel” (p. 104). The story gains power from its concision – little details like the way the narrator describes how “The game warden, straining on the leashes, les dio un tirón, sacó los perros” [“gave them a yank, pulled the dogs away”] (p. 105).
I particularly liked the moments in Borderlands/La Frontera when Spanish prose, or particularly Anzaldúa’s Spanish poetry, was presented untranslated. For instance, Section IV of the book, “Cihuatlyotl, Woman Alone,” began with this poem by Anzaldúa:
Yo llamo a mujer,
canto por mujer,
cubierta con serpientes vengo yo,
al lugar del encuentro me acerco,
repito conjuros para provocar amor.
Clamo por mujer.
Ya llego, llamo. (p. 153)
At first, I simply enjoyed the sheer musicality of Anzaldúa’s poetry, without worrying too much about what some of the specifics meant. After a time, though, I found myself curious to know what it all meant, and then I came up with this translation:
I call to woman,
I sing for woman,
covered with snakes I come,
I approach the meeting place,
I repeat spells to provoke love.
I cry for woman.
I'm here, I call.
At other times, Anzaldúa helpfully provides a translation in English directly after a poem in Spanish, as with the poem that concludes Borderlands/La Frontera: “No se raje, Chicanita” (“Don’t Give in, Chicanita”). Writing directly to Missy Anzaldúa (a daughter?), the speaker invokes the centuries of her people’s time in the Rio Grande Valley, the heritage of dispossession by Anglo-Texans, and then invokes a kind of grito, a cry of resistance:
Pero nunca nos quitarán ese orgullo
de ser mexicana-Chicana-tejana
ni el espíritu indio.
Y cuando los gringos se acaban –
mira como se matan unos a los otros –
aquí vamos a paracer
con los horned toads y los lagartijos
survivors del First Fire Age, el Quinto Sol.
"But they will never take that pride
of being Mexicana-Chicana-tejana
nor our Indian woman’s spirit.
And when the Gringos are gone –
see how they kill one another –
here we’ll still be like the horned toad and the lizard
relics of an earlier age
survivors of the First Fire Age -- el Quinto Sol." (pp. 200, 202)
I found Anzaldúa’s poetry to be excellent in English, and to be even better in Spanish.
The spirit of “La Raza se levantará” (“La Raza will rise up”) is evident throughout this thought-provoking book. Anzaldúa closes the collection by writing, “Como víbora relampagueando nos moveremos, mujercita. ¡Ya verás!” (“Like serpent lightning we’ll move, little woman./You’ll see!”) (pp. 201, 203). One feels Anzaldúa’s spirit of determination on every page of Borderlands/La Frontera.
Anzaldúa was originally from Harlingen, Texas, and in the first section of Borderlands/La Frontera, which is titled “Atravesando Fronteras/Crossing Borders,” she provides a narrative and essayistic look at the different factors from her life that nourished her writing and scholarship. As a Mexican American raised on the U.S. side of the border, she describes facing discrimination from Anglo-Americans in Texas, and from Mexicans of Mexico who felt that, as a Mexican American, she was somehow not as “pure” in her Mexican identity as they were. She describes the challenges of reconciling her pride in Mexico’s pre-Christian religious and cultural past with the devout Catholicism of present-day Mexico. And, as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, she knows that her sexual orientation puts her at odds with the strongly traditionalist gender norms and expectations of Mexico’s patriarchal society. All these factors seem to have nourished her interest in the idea of borders generally.
In one chapter that is titled “La herencia de Coatlicue/The Coatlicue State,” Anzaldúa invokes the Aztec mother goddess Coatlicue who gave birth to the sun, the moon, and the stars. She connects Coatlicue and other Aztec deities with the Virgin of Guadalupe, “the single most potent religious, political, and cultural image of the Chicano/mexicano” (p. 30), stating, in reflections that sometimes sound rather like the work of U.S. Transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau, that
I’ve always been aware that there is a greater power than the conscious I. That power is my inner self, the entity that is the sum total of all my reincarnations, the godwoman in me I call Antigua, mi Diosa, the divine within, Coatlicue-Cihuacoatl-Tlazolteotl-Tonantzin-Coatlalopeuh-Guadalupe – they are one. When to bow down to Her and when to allow the limited conscious mind to take over – that is the problem. (p. 50)
I have visited the great cathedral at Guadalupe where the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared to an Indigenous Mexican farmer named Juan Diego in 1531. I have seen the sacred image behind the altar (one can view it from a moving walkway behind the altar, even while Masses are in progress). Perhaps I am drawn to this book because of my memories of visiting Guadalupe; perhaps it is that I am posting this review on the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a national holiday in Mexico. But whatever the case may be, I found this part of Anzaldúa’s book particularly bold.
After all, linking La Virgen de Guadalupe with motherhood goddesses like Coatlicue, Tonantzin and Cihuacoatl might not be all that surprising. But associating her with Tlazolteotl, the Aztec goddess of sex, desire, and lust? No doubt that raised some eyebrows on both sides of the border. Anzaldúa is certainly fearless in setting forth her non-traditional outlook on her society.
The second half of Borderlands/La Frontera is titled Un Agitato Viento/Ehécatl, The Wind,” and it provides a variety of poems and passages of short fiction that re-emphasize the ideas of the autobiography, essays, and nonfiction of the first section.
One work from this section of the book that stood out for me was “Cervicide,” a short story about a young girl named Prieta. The story focuses on Prieta’s love for “La venadita”, or “The small fawn” that she and her family found the day it was born, after its mother had been shot by a hunter. Prieta has raised the fawn, with deep love, ever since; but a crisis unfolds when a game warden, with his hounds, closes in on the house. It is illegal, under Texas law, to keep a deer in one’s household, and the narrator faces the prospect of having to kill her beloved pet; otherwise, she is told, “The game warden would put su papí en la cárcel” (p. 104). The story gains power from its concision – little details like the way the narrator describes how “The game warden, straining on the leashes, les dio un tirón, sacó los perros” [“gave them a yank, pulled the dogs away”] (p. 105).
I particularly liked the moments in Borderlands/La Frontera when Spanish prose, or particularly Anzaldúa’s Spanish poetry, was presented untranslated. For instance, Section IV of the book, “Cihuatlyotl, Woman Alone,” began with this poem by Anzaldúa:
Yo llamo a mujer,
canto por mujer,
cubierta con serpientes vengo yo,
al lugar del encuentro me acerco,
repito conjuros para provocar amor.
Clamo por mujer.
Ya llego, llamo. (p. 153)
At first, I simply enjoyed the sheer musicality of Anzaldúa’s poetry, without worrying too much about what some of the specifics meant. After a time, though, I found myself curious to know what it all meant, and then I came up with this translation:
I call to woman,
I sing for woman,
covered with snakes I come,
I approach the meeting place,
I repeat spells to provoke love.
I cry for woman.
I'm here, I call.
At other times, Anzaldúa helpfully provides a translation in English directly after a poem in Spanish, as with the poem that concludes Borderlands/La Frontera: “No se raje, Chicanita” (“Don’t Give in, Chicanita”). Writing directly to Missy Anzaldúa (a daughter?), the speaker invokes the centuries of her people’s time in the Rio Grande Valley, the heritage of dispossession by Anglo-Texans, and then invokes a kind of grito, a cry of resistance:
Pero nunca nos quitarán ese orgullo
de ser mexicana-Chicana-tejana
ni el espíritu indio.
Y cuando los gringos se acaban –
mira como se matan unos a los otros –
aquí vamos a paracer
con los horned toads y los lagartijos
survivors del First Fire Age, el Quinto Sol.
"But they will never take that pride
of being Mexicana-Chicana-tejana
nor our Indian woman’s spirit.
And when the Gringos are gone –
see how they kill one another –
here we’ll still be like the horned toad and the lizard
relics of an earlier age
survivors of the First Fire Age -- el Quinto Sol." (pp. 200, 202)
I found Anzaldúa’s poetry to be excellent in English, and to be even better in Spanish.
The spirit of “La Raza se levantará” (“La Raza will rise up”) is evident throughout this thought-provoking book. Anzaldúa closes the collection by writing, “Como víbora relampagueando nos moveremos, mujercita. ¡Ya verás!” (“Like serpent lightning we’ll move, little woman./You’ll see!”) (pp. 201, 203). One feels Anzaldúa’s spirit of determination on every page of Borderlands/La Frontera.
June 30, 2018
Oh well.
January 10, 2016
Gorgeous writing, crafting a way of seeing, experiencing, being in the world. Identity politics at its most rooted and important. The first half of this book is a critical theory essay on the epistemology (way of knowing) of a person whose very being is sin frontéras, crossing borders: Chicana, mestiza, queer, woman, class mobile and educated, critical. This first part devolves a little into esoteric musings I couldn't always grasp; reading, listening, but acknowledging that I didn't understand. Sometimes, literally: Anzaldúa intersperses Spanish and many dialectic variants thereof throughout the text, and while the back of my book says "English readers will understand in context," I didn't much of the time. But the whole time the writing pulses with an urgency and a declaration to take it in as written-- the book doesn't ask readers to understand, it asks readers, particularly those whose identities root them in one or another side of any number of borders, to hear and listen and pay attention to their ignorance. What does it mean to feel destabilized, insecure, uncomprehending within the culture of a text? What does it mean to navigate these social and cultural geographies? Borderlands invites readers to experience the doubt and struggle of this movement, Anzaldúa's chosen, fluid words instead of her constant movement to meet each dominant culture in its own space. This book just feels significant, like learning a lesson.
The second half is poetry, and evoked opposite feelings. Clear, sharp, crystal poetry. Here Anzaldúa writes in narrative, says what she means in language that communicates without leaving room for doubt.
The second half is poetry, and evoked opposite feelings. Clear, sharp, crystal poetry. Here Anzaldúa writes in narrative, says what she means in language that communicates without leaving room for doubt.
February 16, 2008
i have read, am reading, and will continue to read this text as part of preparing for my masters exam in literature. specifically, i am looking at the borderland that anzaldua speaks of as a place of passing (racial, sexual, class) for individuals, and what it means to constantly exist in that space, without a homeland to move toward or away from.
anzalduas prose and poetry are both symbolic and dense; parts of the book are written in spanish, and my understanding of the language is embarrassingly bad. her analysis of mestiza consciousness coupled with the invocation to feminism are rich, as is her attempt to explain the frustrations of speaking a language that also exists in the borderland, a mixture of spanish and english and other languages, and the ensuing condescension from others who speak so-called "pure" languages.
i highly suggest reading her in conjunction with frantz fanon and trinh t. min-ha; it seems a random mix of theorists, but there is much they have to say about the power of language and the formation of cultural identities.
anzalduas prose and poetry are both symbolic and dense; parts of the book are written in spanish, and my understanding of the language is embarrassingly bad. her analysis of mestiza consciousness coupled with the invocation to feminism are rich, as is her attempt to explain the frustrations of speaking a language that also exists in the borderland, a mixture of spanish and english and other languages, and the ensuing condescension from others who speak so-called "pure" languages.
i highly suggest reading her in conjunction with frantz fanon and trinh t. min-ha; it seems a random mix of theorists, but there is much they have to say about the power of language and the formation of cultural identities.
March 21, 2010
“Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza” by Gloria Anzaldúa is a HIGHLY recommended book for anyone interested in indigenous religion, gender studies, the history of the Southwestern United States, the history of the Chicano people, and ALL women of color.
Some passages that resound:
A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary.
The world is not a safe place to live in. We shiver in separate cells in enclosed cities, shoulders hunched, barely keeping the panic below the surface of the skin, daily drinking shock along with our morning coffee, fearing the torches being set to our buildings, the attacks in the streets. Shutting down. Woman does not feel safe when her own culture, and white culture, are critical of her; when the males of all races hunt her as prey.
Institutionalized religion fears trafficking with the spirit world and stigmatizes it as witchcraft. It has strict taboos against this kind of inner knowledge. It fears what Jung calls the Shadow, the unsavory aspects of ourselves. But even more it fears the supra-human, the god in ourselves.
Those who are pushed out of the tribe for being different are likely to become more sensitized (when not brutalized into insensitivity). Those who do not feel psychologically or physically safe in the world are more apt to develop this sense. Those who are pounced on the most have it the strongest – the females, the homosexuals of all races, the darkskinned, the outcast, the persecuted, the marginalized, the foreign.
I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess – that was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler. I remember being sent to the corner of the classroom for “talking back” the the Anglo teacher when all I was trying to do was tell her how to pronounce my name. “If you want to be American, speak ‘American.’ If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.”
Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take pride in myself.
“You’re nothing but a woman” means you are defective. Its opposite is to be un macho. The modern meaning of the word “machismo,” as well as the concept, is actually an Anglo invention. For men like my father, being “macho” meant being strong enough to protect and support my mother and us, yet being able to show love. Today’s macho has doubts about his ability to feed and protect his family. His “machismo” is an adaption to oppression and poverty and low self-esteem.
But don’t take my word for it. Get it, read it. If you’re anything like me, you’ll need to buy the book simply because it cries out for the kiss of a highlighter and caress of a pencil.
... because Sumayyah Said So.
Some passages that resound:
A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary.
The world is not a safe place to live in. We shiver in separate cells in enclosed cities, shoulders hunched, barely keeping the panic below the surface of the skin, daily drinking shock along with our morning coffee, fearing the torches being set to our buildings, the attacks in the streets. Shutting down. Woman does not feel safe when her own culture, and white culture, are critical of her; when the males of all races hunt her as prey.
Institutionalized religion fears trafficking with the spirit world and stigmatizes it as witchcraft. It has strict taboos against this kind of inner knowledge. It fears what Jung calls the Shadow, the unsavory aspects of ourselves. But even more it fears the supra-human, the god in ourselves.
Those who are pushed out of the tribe for being different are likely to become more sensitized (when not brutalized into insensitivity). Those who do not feel psychologically or physically safe in the world are more apt to develop this sense. Those who are pounced on the most have it the strongest – the females, the homosexuals of all races, the darkskinned, the outcast, the persecuted, the marginalized, the foreign.
I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess – that was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler. I remember being sent to the corner of the classroom for “talking back” the the Anglo teacher when all I was trying to do was tell her how to pronounce my name. “If you want to be American, speak ‘American.’ If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.”
Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take pride in myself.
“You’re nothing but a woman” means you are defective. Its opposite is to be un macho. The modern meaning of the word “machismo,” as well as the concept, is actually an Anglo invention. For men like my father, being “macho” meant being strong enough to protect and support my mother and us, yet being able to show love. Today’s macho has doubts about his ability to feed and protect his family. His “machismo” is an adaption to oppression and poverty and low self-esteem.
But don’t take my word for it. Get it, read it. If you’re anything like me, you’ll need to buy the book simply because it cries out for the kiss of a highlighter and caress of a pencil.
... because Sumayyah Said So.
August 9, 2022
Está chingona. La frontera no es solo la herida mexicoamericana, es todo: la que hay entre el (la) yo y el mundo, entre la ciencia social y la poesía, entre hecho e imaginación, entre idiomas, etcétera, ah, y lo queer, obviamente. Also, para ella también hay un limbo donde el misticismo es rey, y aunque yo no me adscribo tanto a eso, el acercamiento es interesante.
Dice por ahí que el desasosiego psíquico es la borderland que nos permite escribir. Dice que la escritura es un ciclo interminable de intensificar el dolor y aliviarlo, pero siempre creando significado de la experiencia. Ah, y el capítulo dedicado a la lengua chicana, bastarda, deficiente, es doloroso y al mismo tiempo, ¿cómo se dice?, esclarecedor; sí estamos muy esquizofrénicas, y me incluyo, vivir demediada es perro.
Lo que no me gusta es la reapropiación de algunas estructuras ya medio anquilosadas. No me meto con los simbolismos indígenas porque conozco demasiado poco (sus fuentes son León Portilla y así), pero el asunto del mestizaje vasconceliano me hizo alzar las cejas un par de veces.
En fin. Chingón. Chingona. Se le nota lo game changer, lo hito, lo áijuela qué fokin paper loco y raro es este.
Dice por ahí que el desasosiego psíquico es la borderland que nos permite escribir. Dice que la escritura es un ciclo interminable de intensificar el dolor y aliviarlo, pero siempre creando significado de la experiencia. Ah, y el capítulo dedicado a la lengua chicana, bastarda, deficiente, es doloroso y al mismo tiempo, ¿cómo se dice?, esclarecedor; sí estamos muy esquizofrénicas, y me incluyo, vivir demediada es perro.
Lo que no me gusta es la reapropiación de algunas estructuras ya medio anquilosadas. No me meto con los simbolismos indígenas porque conozco demasiado poco (sus fuentes son León Portilla y así), pero el asunto del mestizaje vasconceliano me hizo alzar las cejas un par de veces.
En fin. Chingón. Chingona. Se le nota lo game changer, lo hito, lo áijuela qué fokin paper loco y raro es este.
July 24, 2025
ok let me get into this. anzaldúa has made significant contributions toward postcolonial and feminist theory as a xicana lesbian BUT her advocacy for the mestizaje and the mestiza identity is rooted in antiblackness and does little to challenge constructed notions of ethnicity, gender, and race. i enjoyed the parts of her talking about language because that was one of my first postcolonial texts. there are also other xicanx writers who have significantly contributed to postcolonial and feminist canon i.e. perez, trevino, trujillo.
August 20, 2019
This book appeals to me on an anthropological level (it brought back a lot of memories of my cultural anthropology classes). The author, however, goes above and beyond to explain (defend?) her culture while maintaining an accusatory tone towards European-American (white) culture. This type of writing is neither unique nor unexpected, so the author's attitude doesn't bother or surprise me. Studying anthropology has definitely made me aware of the pitfalls of ethnocentrism as well as the joys of learning about other cultures. The author does heavily sprinkle Spanish into this work, which can be intimidating if the reader is completely unfamiliar with that language (could be off-putting or alienating for some). A great thing this book offers is an insider's view of a rich and beautiful culture. This culture is not totally unknown to me since I have lived near the South Texas/Mexico borderland all my life, so I enjoyed the familiarity of that particular aspect of the book.
February 7, 2025
http://divagaciones-de-una-poulain.bl...
Desde que leí a Sandra Cisneros (Caramelo y La casa en Mango Street) he estado buscando desesperadamente literatura chicana. No mexicana. No, chicana, escrita en inglés y publicada en inglés por inmigrantes en Estados Unidos. Preferentemente de chicanos, mexicanos, pero cualquier inmigrante está bien o hijos de migrantes, me da exactamente igual. Gloria E. Anzaldúa es Texana de sexta generación, dice el libro; su familia ya estaba allí cuando Texas era aun territorio mexicano, antes de que declarara su independencia en uno de los gobiernos de Santa Ana, antes de que se anexara a Estados Unidos y los blancos arrasaron con las tierras de los mexicanos, relegándolos para siempre. Nació siendo mexicana y americana a la vez, de una cultura que ya no era la mexicana que habían conocido sus antepasados, pero que tampoco es estadounidense. Ella misma lo dice en las primeras páginas del libro:
Borderlands/La frontera es un libro de identidad, la pérdida de ella y su búsqueda. Está dividido en varias partes, pero al menos yo lo dividí en mi cabeza en dos grandes pedazos. La primera mitad, más o menos, son ensayos. Todo el resto son poemas de Gloria E. Anzaldúa. El libro entero está escrito en spanglish y hay muchas cosas que no tienen traducción (aunque pequeños pedazos en los poemas sí que tienen una traducción al final) lo que da una pista al público al que va dirigido: a los mismos chicanos y mexicanos. De todo el libro, prefiero a la Gloria ensayista y, de los poemas, prefiero a la Gloria que los escribe en español. Sin embargo, tengo que decir que a pesar de los altos y bajos del libro, es magnífico.
¿Por dónde empiezo? Gloria se usa a sí misma (y a sus conocidos) para analizar la cultura de la frontera, la de Texas. De como no son ni mexicanos ni americanos. De como su español tiene acento y su inglés también y toda su vida han escondido uno u otro según con quien hablan o a quien se dirigen. Habla de como sus maestros los castigaban por ser demasiado mexicanos: hablar español. De como su madre sufría cada que hablaba inglés como inmigrante porque decía que nunca encontraría trabajo y de cómo se ha visto discriminada por los mismos mexicanos al usar su acento chicano.
Anzaldúa dice cómo los mexicanos son más espirituales que los estadounidenses, cosa en la que sinceramente no estoy tan de acuerdo. Creo que cada quien es diferente y es un mundo y nosotros como cultura no nos escapamos de eso. Pero aprovecha esa espiritualidad para analizar la identidad que llevamos los mexicanos, con la influencia de Coatlicue, la madre tierra de los Aztecas que dio a luz a Huitzilopochtli (el dios de la guerra) después de embarazarse con una pluma, de la Malinche, una de las esclavas que le regalaron los tlaxcaltecas a Hernán Cortés y que fue una pieza importante en la conquista y, finalmente, como mexicanos, de la Virgen de Guadalupe, la otra cara de Tonantzin, un título azteca que significa Nuesstra Madre Verdadera y que se le daba principalmente a Coatlicue y a Cihuacoatl (la Mujer Serpiente). Quizá me sentí identificada porque así atea como soy he oído a la gente renegar de la Malinche toda la vida y he presenciado la veneración que se le tiene a la virgen de Guadalupe.
Es una lástima que siento que Anzaldúa teme dar conclusiones certeras, pero me gusta el análisis que hace. Usa todo para analizar su propia cultura, a la que llama "a border culture" (una cultura de la frontera) y a situarse a sí misma en ella, como mexicana, lesbiana, como chicana, como estadounidense. Lo mismo hace con su lengua y sus raíces. Más arriba ya dije que Gloria menciona en cierta parte del libro que su mamá se horrorizaba al oírla hablar inglés con acento mexicano porque decía que le sería imposible conseguir trabajo. Tiene una cultura que siempre se ve forzada a caminar entre dos idiomas y ninguno es de ellos: el inglés lo hablan con acento, el español también.
La cultura, la lengua y la identidad son una gran parte de lo que escribe y presenta Anzaldúa en este libro. Es casi todo el libro, aunque también aprovecha para hablar de ella misma y su escritura y de su sorpresa la primera vez que vio a un Chicano publicado y se convenció de que ella también podía lograrlo. Sus poemas siguen la misma línea y ocupan poco más de la mitad del libro. Pero si no les gustara la poesía y aun así les interesara el tema del libro, les aseguro que el libro lo vale todo sólo por sus ensayos y sus análisis.
Anzaldúa, sin glorificar su cultura, también hace notar el machismo existente entre los mexicanos y lo que les han enseñado: "calladita te ves más bonita". También, ¡por fin!, hace notar que la palabra machismo viene del inglés, al menos para ellos, y que para sus padres, ser macho no era algo malo: significaba ser fuerte para poder proteger a sus esposas y a sus hijas. La connotación negativa llega después, con el feminismo y los movimientos de liberación. Deja claro que las mujeres ya no quieren ser protegidas, sino andar a la par de los hombres
Libro recomendado, sobre todo para los mexicanos. lo leí en inglés (desconozco su el libro está traducido), pero el libro entero está en spanglish: tiene expresiones mexicanas (norteñas en su mayoría) en todas y cada una de las páginas, recordándonos que, antes que cualquier otra cosa, Gloria es Chicana. Muy recomendado.
Desde que leí a Sandra Cisneros (Caramelo y La casa en Mango Street) he estado buscando desesperadamente literatura chicana. No mexicana. No, chicana, escrita en inglés y publicada en inglés por inmigrantes en Estados Unidos. Preferentemente de chicanos, mexicanos, pero cualquier inmigrante está bien o hijos de migrantes, me da exactamente igual. Gloria E. Anzaldúa es Texana de sexta generación, dice el libro; su familia ya estaba allí cuando Texas era aun territorio mexicano, antes de que declarara su independencia en uno de los gobiernos de Santa Ana, antes de que se anexara a Estados Unidos y los blancos arrasaron con las tierras de los mexicanos, relegándolos para siempre. Nació siendo mexicana y americana a la vez, de una cultura que ya no era la mexicana que habían conocido sus antepasados, pero que tampoco es estadounidense. Ella misma lo dice en las primeras páginas del libro:
This land was Mexican once,
was Indian always
and is.
And will be again. [...]
The U.S-Mexican border es una herida abierta where the Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country — a border culture.
Borderlands/La frontera es un libro de identidad, la pérdida de ella y su búsqueda. Está dividido en varias partes, pero al menos yo lo dividí en mi cabeza en dos grandes pedazos. La primera mitad, más o menos, son ensayos. Todo el resto son poemas de Gloria E. Anzaldúa. El libro entero está escrito en spanglish y hay muchas cosas que no tienen traducción (aunque pequeños pedazos en los poemas sí que tienen una traducción al final) lo que da una pista al público al que va dirigido: a los mismos chicanos y mexicanos. De todo el libro, prefiero a la Gloria ensayista y, de los poemas, prefiero a la Gloria que los escribe en español. Sin embargo, tengo que decir que a pesar de los altos y bajos del libro, es magnífico.
¿Por dónde empiezo? Gloria se usa a sí misma (y a sus conocidos) para analizar la cultura de la frontera, la de Texas. De como no son ni mexicanos ni americanos. De como su español tiene acento y su inglés también y toda su vida han escondido uno u otro según con quien hablan o a quien se dirigen. Habla de como sus maestros los castigaban por ser demasiado mexicanos: hablar español. De como su madre sufría cada que hablaba inglés como inmigrante porque decía que nunca encontraría trabajo y de cómo se ha visto discriminada por los mismos mexicanos al usar su acento chicano.
Anzaldúa dice cómo los mexicanos son más espirituales que los estadounidenses, cosa en la que sinceramente no estoy tan de acuerdo. Creo que cada quien es diferente y es un mundo y nosotros como cultura no nos escapamos de eso. Pero aprovecha esa espiritualidad para analizar la identidad que llevamos los mexicanos, con la influencia de Coatlicue, la madre tierra de los Aztecas que dio a luz a Huitzilopochtli (el dios de la guerra) después de embarazarse con una pluma, de la Malinche, una de las esclavas que le regalaron los tlaxcaltecas a Hernán Cortés y que fue una pieza importante en la conquista y, finalmente, como mexicanos, de la Virgen de Guadalupe, la otra cara de Tonantzin, un título azteca que significa Nuesstra Madre Verdadera y que se le daba principalmente a Coatlicue y a Cihuacoatl (la Mujer Serpiente). Quizá me sentí identificada porque así atea como soy he oído a la gente renegar de la Malinche toda la vida y he presenciado la veneración que se le tiene a la virgen de Guadalupe.
Es una lástima que siento que Anzaldúa teme dar conclusiones certeras, pero me gusta el análisis que hace. Usa todo para analizar su propia cultura, a la que llama "a border culture" (una cultura de la frontera) y a situarse a sí misma en ella, como mexicana, lesbiana, como chicana, como estadounidense. Lo mismo hace con su lengua y sus raíces. Más arriba ya dije que Gloria menciona en cierta parte del libro que su mamá se horrorizaba al oírla hablar inglés con acento mexicano porque decía que le sería imposible conseguir trabajo. Tiene una cultura que siempre se ve forzada a caminar entre dos idiomas y ninguno es de ellos: el inglés lo hablan con acento, el español también.
Deslenguadas. Somos las del español deficiente. We are your linguistic nightmare, your linguistic aberration, your linguistic mestisaje, the subject of your burla. Because we speak with tongues of fire we are culturally crucified. Racially, culturally and linguistically somos huérfanos —we speak an orphan tongue.
La cultura, la lengua y la identidad son una gran parte de lo que escribe y presenta Anzaldúa en este libro. Es casi todo el libro, aunque también aprovecha para hablar de ella misma y su escritura y de su sorpresa la primera vez que vio a un Chicano publicado y se convenció de que ella también podía lograrlo. Sus poemas siguen la misma línea y ocupan poco más de la mitad del libro. Pero si no les gustara la poesía y aun así les interesara el tema del libro, les aseguro que el libro lo vale todo sólo por sus ensayos y sus análisis.
Anzaldúa, sin glorificar su cultura, también hace notar el machismo existente entre los mexicanos y lo que les han enseñado: "calladita te ves más bonita". También, ¡por fin!, hace notar que la palabra machismo viene del inglés, al menos para ellos, y que para sus padres, ser macho no era algo malo: significaba ser fuerte para poder proteger a sus esposas y a sus hijas. La connotación negativa llega después, con el feminismo y los movimientos de liberación. Deja claro que las mujeres ya no quieren ser protegidas, sino andar a la par de los hombres
Libro recomendado, sobre todo para los mexicanos. lo leí en inglés (desconozco su el libro está traducido), pero el libro entero está en spanglish: tiene expresiones mexicanas (norteñas en su mayoría) en todas y cada una de las páginas, recordándonos que, antes que cualquier otra cosa, Gloria es Chicana. Muy recomendado.
May 22, 2007
For the mid-80s thinking and theory about the intersection of culture, race, and feminism--this book is radical. A bible to understanding what it means to live in a borderland... a fast read, engaging, but VERY thought provoking. the form mixes, Spanish/Chicanoism, poetry, prose, theory, academia, and the essay- Anzaldua continually disrupts you and the text, always evolving the question of identity.
February 1, 2014
Having finished the first portion of the book (as the rest is poetry), I can say that I quite enjoyed it. The book reads like a monologue, something I believe Anzaldua intended. She stated that she's an adamant believers in writing truths and I was struck with how blatantly open her words were and how much they hit home.
I don't refer to myself as a Chicana (as my Word Processor underlines chicana as a misspelled word, substituting it for Chicano, I'm remind of Anzaldua's passage "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", I find myself laughing at the irony). The word Chicana always held a political quality to it, something that I felt I did not possess, so I called myself Latina (for the lack of a better term). I'm not one for labeling. I'd call myself a citizen of the Earth, but alas, that's too broad of a term especially for those who inquire about my specific heritage.
It's funny because I related to much of what she said but I also found myself excluded from a lot as well.
"'Pocho, cultural traitor, you're speaking the oppressor's language by speaking English, you're ruining the Spanish language.' I have been accused by various Latinos and Latinas."
That passage hit home. Too close for comfort actually. My first language was Spanish so I feel like there was no excuse for me not to be proficient in it. But my parent's (dad arriving at 16 and mom when she was just a baby to the U.S) already used this Chicano-Spanish Anzaldua talked about. I grew up speaking broken Spanish. As I grew up I began to realize how horrid my Spanish actually was and because I felt so self-conscious about it, I refrained form using it often. Now I fear it is quite atrocious. I get red-faced whenever I speak with my grandma and/or elders because I feel ashamed. I can't help but think that as I speak to them in my broken Spanish that they feel sorry for me.
That passage both relate's and doesn't to what Anzaldua meant. Anzaldua embraced it and I shunned it. Actually, I feel like my english is still inadequate, especially when talking to Anglo's and now I don't feel right in either language. I quite appreciate that Anzaldua wrote in the way that she felt most comfortable in (damn those who told her otherwise) and hopefully one day I'll be able to find the language I feel comfortable in too.
I don't refer to myself as a Chicana (as my Word Processor underlines chicana as a misspelled word, substituting it for Chicano, I'm remind of Anzaldua's passage "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", I find myself laughing at the irony). The word Chicana always held a political quality to it, something that I felt I did not possess, so I called myself Latina (for the lack of a better term). I'm not one for labeling. I'd call myself a citizen of the Earth, but alas, that's too broad of a term especially for those who inquire about my specific heritage.
It's funny because I related to much of what she said but I also found myself excluded from a lot as well.
"'Pocho, cultural traitor, you're speaking the oppressor's language by speaking English, you're ruining the Spanish language.' I have been accused by various Latinos and Latinas."
That passage hit home. Too close for comfort actually. My first language was Spanish so I feel like there was no excuse for me not to be proficient in it. But my parent's (dad arriving at 16 and mom when she was just a baby to the U.S) already used this Chicano-Spanish Anzaldua talked about. I grew up speaking broken Spanish. As I grew up I began to realize how horrid my Spanish actually was and because I felt so self-conscious about it, I refrained form using it often. Now I fear it is quite atrocious. I get red-faced whenever I speak with my grandma and/or elders because I feel ashamed. I can't help but think that as I speak to them in my broken Spanish that they feel sorry for me.
That passage both relate's and doesn't to what Anzaldua meant. Anzaldua embraced it and I shunned it. Actually, I feel like my english is still inadequate, especially when talking to Anglo's and now I don't feel right in either language. I quite appreciate that Anzaldua wrote in the way that she felt most comfortable in (damn those who told her otherwise) and hopefully one day I'll be able to find the language I feel comfortable in too.
January 25, 2019
The primary reason this gets five stars is its importance -- in the 80s when it was written and even moreso now. It was a groundbreaking classic then (especially for people who identified as chicana and/or lesbian) and, I think, absolutely needs to be read by a larger audience now. Gloria Anzaldua writes about the experience of inhabiting multiple identities (chicana, male/female, lesbian, mexican, indigenous, texan) and the challenge of moving in multiple worlds (at times all most have rejected all that she represents). Importantly, she challenges the notion of border. (And further educates on the US history of oppression in a way that has still not been acknowledged by the dominant culture.)
Her prose is wise, her poetry visceral and powerful.
This book is important in understanding the experience of the marginalized. And, as importantly, it is important for everyone/all of us who - even when our identities aren't at 'the border' - have been influenced by a culture to fit in and be less than our fully authentic selves.
The book is interspersed with Spanish and English. I understand enough Spanish to speak like a toddler, so much of the impact of the Spanish words was lost on me. I translated some of it. But, mostly, I read aloud the words, understanding every 2nd word. There was something about speaking the words, even when I didn't understand them, that helped me participate more in this important book.
Her prose is wise, her poetry visceral and powerful.
This book is important in understanding the experience of the marginalized. And, as importantly, it is important for everyone/all of us who - even when our identities aren't at 'the border' - have been influenced by a culture to fit in and be less than our fully authentic selves.
The book is interspersed with Spanish and English. I understand enough Spanish to speak like a toddler, so much of the impact of the Spanish words was lost on me. I translated some of it. But, mostly, I read aloud the words, understanding every 2nd word. There was something about speaking the words, even when I didn't understand them, that helped me participate more in this important book.
December 13, 2007
Borderlands/La Frontera is supposed to be an important Latina feminist work, and I'm sure it was groundbreaking when it came out and important to many people now. I didn't really enjoy the poetry (half the book) or the experimental writing forms (a good part of the other half). I really enjoyed some parts of the book, such as Gloria Anzaldua's discussions on languages "we" speak and sexuality, but being bored by seventy percent of the book did not really leave me with a great impression.
April 20, 2014
This book is one of the classics in feminist decolonial theory. It's a beautiful story about Anzaldua's life as a Chicana growing up near the US-Mexico border. I could relate to what she says about mixed races and borders and identity. But somehow I found it difficult to agree with her on culture. Blanket generalizations about culture being bad never sit well with me since we are never outside of culture, and so presumably good and bad both come from culture.
July 19, 2017
It's hard to "review" something this good, this special, this singular. It also seems unnecessary. After all, this is a germinal, oft referenced, essential book for reasons that quickly become self-evident after opening its pages. But I can offer a sentence or two, despite sounding like ad copy.
What Anzaldúa offers here, among other things, is a powerful weaving of psychoanalysis with a meditation of the radical heterogeneity of identities and experiences organized under the rubrics of indigenous, Chicana, and queer.
This is a text about a new way of life that involves accepted the repressed and rejected, and a cessation of the cycle of repression and rejection. It is a text about living with contradiction, paradox, and ambiguity.
In Anzaldúa's own words:
What Anzaldúa offers here, among other things, is a powerful weaving of psychoanalysis with a meditation of the radical heterogeneity of identities and experiences organized under the rubrics of indigenous, Chicana, and queer.
This is a text about a new way of life that involves accepted the repressed and rejected, and a cessation of the cycle of repression and rejection. It is a text about living with contradiction, paradox, and ambiguity.
In Anzaldúa's own words:
Her first step is to take inventory. Despojando, desgranando, quitando paja.
Just what did she inherit from her ancestors? This weight on her back—which is the baggage from the Indian mother, which the baggage from the Spanish father, which the baggage from the Anglo?
Pero es dificil differentiating between lo heredado, lo adquirido, lo impuesto.
She puts history through a sieve, winnows out the lies, looks at the forces that we as a race,
as women, have been part of. Luego bota lo que no vale, los desmientos, los desencuentos,
el embrutecimiento. Aguarda el juicio, hondo y enraízado, de la gente antigua. This step is a conscious rupture with all oppressive traditions of all cultures and religions. She communicates that rupture, documents the struggle. She reinterprets history and, using new symbols,
she shapes new myths. She adopts new perspectives toward the darkskinned, women and queers.
She strengthens her tolerance (and intolerance) for ambiguity. She is willing to share,
to make herself vulnerable to foreign ways of seeing and thinking. She surrenders all notions of safety, of the familiar. Deconstruct, construct. She becomes a nahula, able to transform herself into a tree, a coyote, into another person. She learns to transform the small "I"
into the total Self. Se hace moldeadora de su alma. Según la concepción que tiene de sí misma así será.
April 4, 2020
الكتاب ذاكرة شخصية تختلط مع عمل نظري حول فكرة الحدود ، تجمع فيه غلوريا بصورة جميلة بين ذكرياتها و اشعار وافكار تقع في مجالات مختلفة ، الحد الذي ليس مادي فقط بل نفسي و معنوي و يمكن القول كولونيالي هو ما حدد النظرة الى المكسيكيين ذوي الاصول الهندية القديمة والتي تداخلت مع الاسبان الذين احتلوهم فيما بعد والانجلوفونيين الذين احتلوهم بعدها فصنع ذلك ما تسميه بال ميستيزا الانثى ذات الاصول المختلفة والتي ظلت في منطقة المنبوذ بتعبير اغامبين تقع في منطقة ثقافتها لا هي بالمكسيكية ولا بالامريكية بل خليط ولذلك يسمى قاطنو المنطقة غربي تكساس بالشيكانو بحيث يعبرون عن هويتهم فقط لا هوية امريكا ولا المكسيك لكننا نرى بوضوح ان غلوريا تجنح الى المكسيك بصفتها الاصل والجذر و تبتعد من امريكا لانها تحاول تبديد ثقافة هذا الاصل بل وتهميشه حيث يعمل الشيكانو في الوظائف الصغيرة في المصانع مثلا و يتعرضون للتمييز ، كنسوية ايضا تضاد ما تراه عادات ضارة بالمراة وثقافة مسيئة لها بكل ما اوتيت من كلمة ، و تغلب على كتابتها اثر الميثولوجيا القديمة حيث قبائل الازتك تتخللها في الكتابة كحالة وجدانية ، وتعبر عنها كهوية جسدية تربط اكثر من عامل وتربطها هي ايضا بالفن في العالم الحديث ، تحكي عن اللغة التي لا تطوع و الهامشيين الذين بغربتهم يحددون معنى الحياة من جديد وتأمل في وعي جديد يصنعونه بكسر الانماط السائدة
August 21, 2007
Cuál es la historia que debemos construir? Cómo construimos esa historia? Quién debe contarla? Qué idioma? Qué es el idioma? La tinta es el camino para deconstruir la cultura o construirla?
La imagen de la mujer se traduce en un nuevo cuerpo que reclama un nuevo lugar.
Which is the History that we should build? How do we build that History? Who should tell the History? Which language? What is language? Black ink as a way to deconstruct culture or build it?
The image of women is translated into a new body that claim for a new place.
La imagen de la mujer se traduce en un nuevo cuerpo que reclama un nuevo lugar.
Which is the History that we should build? How do we build that History? Who should tell the History? Which language? What is language? Black ink as a way to deconstruct culture or build it?
The image of women is translated into a new body that claim for a new place.
June 29, 2011
Wild, formidable, preoccupied with Kristevian semiotics. Gloria Anzaldua ambitiously discusses how la mestiza must straddle three cultures: American, Mexican, and Indigenous, and asserts that what is needed is a "tolerance for ambiguity" and an internalization of the mulitplicity of female selves. She describes this internalization as an internalization of the attributes of the Nahua Goddess, Coatlicue. A very sensual, politically and socially conscious book.
July 25, 2008
A little too pissed off for my taste. There's nowhere to go with that anger -- like when someone therapeutically dumps all their crap on you and then THEY feel better; meanwhile, you're left with nothing but a steaming pile of doo-doo. I suppose I could find a more eloquent way of saying that, but you get the idea.
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October 9, 2021Mikä kulttuuriteko, että Anzaldúan vuoden 1987 teos on viimein suomennettu! Rajaseutu / La Frontera on ensimmäisiä chicana-feminismin teoksia ja Anzaldúa kuului myös ensimmäisiin queer-teoreetikoihin. Tekstit ovat intuitiivisia, kehollisia, historiatietoisia, älyllisiä, raadollisia, uutta kuvittelevia.
Teoksen ensimmäinen osa koostuu esseemäisistä teksteistä joihin on siroteltu myös runoja. Toinen osa koostuu yksinomaan runoista. Suomennoksen ratkaisut ovat huolella mietittyjä ja toimivia. Kannattaa lukea myös esipuheet ja suomentajien jälkisanat.
"Meissä ja la cultura chicanassa valkoisen kulttuurin käsitykset hyökkäävät meksikolaisen kulttuurin vakaumuksia vastaan, ja ne kummatkin hyökkäävät alkuperäiskulttuurin uskomuksia vastaan. Tulkitsemme alitajuisesti hyökkäyksen meitä ja käsityksiämme kohtaan uhaksi ja koetamme estää sen asettumalla vastahankaan.
Mutta ei riitä, että haastaa patriarkaaliset ja valkoiset tottumukset joen vastarannalla seisten ja sieltä kysymyksiään huudellen. Vastanäkökulmaan lukkiutuva tuomitsee samalla itsensä sortajan ja sorretun kaksintaisteluun, kuolemaan asti käytävään kamppailuun, jossa osapuolet - kuten poliisin ja rikollisen yhteenotossa - pelkistyvät yhteiseen nimittäjäänsä: väkivaltaan. Torjuessaan valtakulttuurin näkökulmat ja uskomukset vastanäkökulman edustaja on ylpeän uhmakas. Mutta reaktio on rajoittunut teko, aina riippuvainen siitä, mitä vastaan se reagoi. Koska vastanäkökulma kumpuaa auktoriteettiongelmasta - ulkoisesta ja sisäisestä - se on askel kohti kulttuurisesta sorrosta vapautumista. Mutta näin ei voi elää. jossain vaiheessa tiellämme kohti uutta tietoisuutta meidän on jätettävä vastaranta, päästävä tilanteeseen, jossa verivihollisten välinen haava alkaa parantua, jossa voimme olla molemmilla rannoilla samanaikaisesti ja nähdä sekä käärmeen että kotkan silmin. Tai ehkäpä päätämme irrottautua valtakulttuurista, todeta sen menetetyksi tapaukseksi, ylittää rajan ja lähteä toisaalle, täysin uudelle alueelle. Tai voimme valita jonkin toisen tien. Mahdollisuuksia on lukemattomia, kunhan toimimme emmekä vain reagoi." (s. 119-120)
"[...]
Rajaseudulla
olet taistelutanner,
jolla viholliset ovat sukua toisilleen;
olet kotonasi vieras,
rajakiistat on sovittu
laukausten ryöppy on rikkonut aselevon
olet haavoittunut, kadonnut taistelussa,
kuollut puolustautuessasi;
Rajaseudulla eläminen tarkoittaa
että myllyn valkoiset terävät hampaat haluavat repiä rikki
oliivinpunaisen ihosi, sammuttaa ytimen, sydämesi
musertaa sinut rutistaa sinut liiskata sinut
kunnes käryät valkoiselta leivältä mutta olet kuollut;
Rajaseudulla selviytyäksesi
sinun täytyy elää sin fronteras [vailla rajoja]
olla risteys."
(s. 251-252)
Teoksen ensimmäinen osa koostuu esseemäisistä teksteistä joihin on siroteltu myös runoja. Toinen osa koostuu yksinomaan runoista. Suomennoksen ratkaisut ovat huolella mietittyjä ja toimivia. Kannattaa lukea myös esipuheet ja suomentajien jälkisanat.
"Meissä ja la cultura chicanassa valkoisen kulttuurin käsitykset hyökkäävät meksikolaisen kulttuurin vakaumuksia vastaan, ja ne kummatkin hyökkäävät alkuperäiskulttuurin uskomuksia vastaan. Tulkitsemme alitajuisesti hyökkäyksen meitä ja käsityksiämme kohtaan uhaksi ja koetamme estää sen asettumalla vastahankaan.
Mutta ei riitä, että haastaa patriarkaaliset ja valkoiset tottumukset joen vastarannalla seisten ja sieltä kysymyksiään huudellen. Vastanäkökulmaan lukkiutuva tuomitsee samalla itsensä sortajan ja sorretun kaksintaisteluun, kuolemaan asti käytävään kamppailuun, jossa osapuolet - kuten poliisin ja rikollisen yhteenotossa - pelkistyvät yhteiseen nimittäjäänsä: väkivaltaan. Torjuessaan valtakulttuurin näkökulmat ja uskomukset vastanäkökulman edustaja on ylpeän uhmakas. Mutta reaktio on rajoittunut teko, aina riippuvainen siitä, mitä vastaan se reagoi. Koska vastanäkökulma kumpuaa auktoriteettiongelmasta - ulkoisesta ja sisäisestä - se on askel kohti kulttuurisesta sorrosta vapautumista. Mutta näin ei voi elää. jossain vaiheessa tiellämme kohti uutta tietoisuutta meidän on jätettävä vastaranta, päästävä tilanteeseen, jossa verivihollisten välinen haava alkaa parantua, jossa voimme olla molemmilla rannoilla samanaikaisesti ja nähdä sekä käärmeen että kotkan silmin. Tai ehkäpä päätämme irrottautua valtakulttuurista, todeta sen menetetyksi tapaukseksi, ylittää rajan ja lähteä toisaalle, täysin uudelle alueelle. Tai voimme valita jonkin toisen tien. Mahdollisuuksia on lukemattomia, kunhan toimimme emmekä vain reagoi." (s. 119-120)
"[...]
Rajaseudulla
olet taistelutanner,
jolla viholliset ovat sukua toisilleen;
olet kotonasi vieras,
rajakiistat on sovittu
laukausten ryöppy on rikkonut aselevon
olet haavoittunut, kadonnut taistelussa,
kuollut puolustautuessasi;
Rajaseudulla eläminen tarkoittaa
että myllyn valkoiset terävät hampaat haluavat repiä rikki
oliivinpunaisen ihosi, sammuttaa ytimen, sydämesi
musertaa sinut rutistaa sinut liiskata sinut
kunnes käryät valkoiselta leivältä mutta olet kuollut;
Rajaseudulla selviytyäksesi
sinun täytyy elää sin fronteras [vailla rajoja]
olla risteys."
(s. 251-252)
October 11, 2013
Gloria Anzaldua is a borderland. She sticks to no confines because "rigidity is death." She knows who she is and she knows that she is ever changing. She knows her culture, she knows her history, and she knows her biography.
In Borderlands/La Frontera, feminist Chicana Anzaldua uses several forms of writing (fiction, poetry, social history) to share with the world her culture. Through code-switching, she writes about what it means to be Mexican, American, and Native American. She explores how the Treaty of Guadelupe-Hidalgo, which created the border between Mexico and America, changed her life and created her culture. Anzaldua grew up on the Rio Grande in Texas, the actual border of the US. She lived with people who were once Mexican but then forced into America. They lost their country, they lost their culture, and although they became Americans, they weren't accepted as such. Thus came the creation of the Chicano/a, a border culture with their own language, their own ideals etc.
Anzaldua is an extraordinarily spiritual person, and that is evident in her writing. As are her feminist views and queer identity. She lays everything out on the line. She writes a novel about a culture that's often not heard from, not seen--marginalized and trivialized. Yet, with this novel, she gives them a voice--she gives them an identity.
"I will have my voice," she says. And she does.
In Borderlands/La Frontera, feminist Chicana Anzaldua uses several forms of writing (fiction, poetry, social history) to share with the world her culture. Through code-switching, she writes about what it means to be Mexican, American, and Native American. She explores how the Treaty of Guadelupe-Hidalgo, which created the border between Mexico and America, changed her life and created her culture. Anzaldua grew up on the Rio Grande in Texas, the actual border of the US. She lived with people who were once Mexican but then forced into America. They lost their country, they lost their culture, and although they became Americans, they weren't accepted as such. Thus came the creation of the Chicano/a, a border culture with their own language, their own ideals etc.
Anzaldua is an extraordinarily spiritual person, and that is evident in her writing. As are her feminist views and queer identity. She lays everything out on the line. She writes a novel about a culture that's often not heard from, not seen--marginalized and trivialized. Yet, with this novel, she gives them a voice--she gives them an identity.
"I will have my voice," she says. And she does.
October 13, 2015
The prose is interesting at times, but the poetry is cliche and overwrought to the extent that it taints the entire book, significantly downgrading my ability to appreciate it. It's probably no mistake that criticism on the book focuses almost entirely on the prose and ignores the poetry, but the poetry makes up a significant portion of the book, so how can you completely ignore it? When I've brought this up to people in the past, they made it seem like, because I chose to focus on the poetry, I simply didn't 'get' the book. Would've been better if they were separated as two different publications, in my opinion.
May 11, 2023
Recueil d'essais et de poèmes, ce livre de Gloria Anzaldúa, féministe chicana et théoricienne queer, explore ce qui signifie vivre sur un territoire-frontière, à la croisée d'identités et de réalités politiques. Elle retrace le peuplement des territoires américains et les impacts de la colonisation sur les Indiens : un quasi-génocide, l'accaparement des terres, la mise en dépendance, la colonisation de la spiritualité... De manière intime et puissante, elle évoque le racisme et la misogynie, l'expérience d'être Chicana et lesbienne. Un livre unique en son genre, riche de réflexions politiques, poétiques et historiques, reflétant la complexité de l'existence à la frontière.
July 23, 2018
Importante reflexión sobre la identidad chicana, sobre las fronteras, feminismo, colonialismo... Todo plasmado en un texto híbrido donde me gustaría destacar la poesía de Anzaldúa, que es maravillosa.
January 21, 2016
Truly one of the most influential reads during my doctoral studies!
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January 14, 20233.5
great feminist analysis, recommend to poetry luvers.
great feminist analysis, recommend to poetry luvers.
February 10, 2025
"To survive the Borderlands
you must live sin fronteras
be a crossroads."
you must live sin fronteras
be a crossroads."
April 25, 2023
Somos los del español deficiente. We are your linguistic nightmare, your linguistic aberration, your linguistic mestisaje, the subject of your burla. Because we speak with tongues of fire we are culturally crucified. Racially, culturally and linguistically somos huérfanos - we speak an orphan tongue.
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