Summing up what I’ve learned about all of the different aspects of this course, from archiving to Chicana feminism to oral history techniques, is kind of a big task. Over the semester, we’ve gone over (in discussion and in practice) the history of the Chicano movement, Chicana feminism and its relationship with that movement and the feminist movement, archiving techniques and research methods, oral history collection and analysis, and the framing of historical social movements. In order to really address the breadth of information I’ve acquired and skills I’ve developed through working on the Chicana Por Mi Raza project, I have to break down each aspect of the project individually, otherwise I’ll just end up spewing a jumble of ideas that make no coherent sense. That may end up happening either way, but here goes...
The Chicano Movement, the Feminist Movement, and Chicana Feminism:
It’s impossible to talk about Chicana feminism without also discussing its relationship to these other two movements because history often frames Chicana feminism in terms of them. As a Women’s Studies major and an adamant feminist, I came into the project with ideas about women’s roles in the Chicano movement, Chicanas’ participation in the women’s movement, and the rise of women-of-color feminism, which proved helpful to me at times, and also limiting at times. Over the course of the class I learned a lot more about each individual movement and their struggles, particularly the Chicano movement and the labor struggles that were a huge part of it. I think the biggest thing I took away about Chicano history in the U.S. is a less Southwest-centered viewpoint. I had often been frustrated by the focus on California and Texas as the centers of Latino-American rhetoric and history because I felt excluded as an East-Coast Bolivian, and learning about the industrial boom in the midwest that brought Latinos, especially Mexicans here to Michigan was very refreshing. Reading Latinos in Michigan and hearing firsthand accounts of growing up in Detroit from Elena Herrada helped put the diversity of experiences among Latinos in the U.S. in perspective for me and also opened up a series of narratives about immigration and culture that are not as mainstream or Southwest-based, and which were much more familiar to my own experience.
I already had a pretty solid working knowledge of feminist history in the U.S. and even of the struggles between white feminists and women of color, and had been aware for some time of the dominance of black feminists in the women-of-color feminist sphere, so I also had some frustrations about feeling excluded from that movement as well. But over the course of the class, I broadened my view of those issues and of the way they’ve been recounted and my preconceived notions about how Chicana feminism fit into the feminist and Chicano movements’ histories kept changing and developing. I found myself beginning to abandon the way I had thought about women-of-color feminism in favor of a more dimensional approach that didn’t adhere to the dominant narratives of other movements but rather framed the Chicana feminist movement in its own terms. Reading Maylei Blackwell’s Chicana Power! was instrumental to my learning, and it really cemented the idea of redefining how we see history a opposed to just acknowledging diversity. I had been aware of the dominance of white women in the feminist movement, and the dominance of men in the Chicano movement, but had always seen Chicanas and other women of color in the context of those dominant narratives as opposed to active agents working in their own spheres.
The way history is organized and retold is defined by who was and is in power, so I had always thought of women of color’s involvement in different movements as defined by the others who dominated them. Blackwell proposes the idea of reshaping how we see history based not on dominance but on individuals, and the rest of her book is laid out in a way that follows the Chicana movement as its own entity, which I found really interesting and helpful. What she really stressed and what I connected to the most was the idea of being an outsider in both the feminist and Chicano movements and being treated as inauthentic or disloyal because of intersecting identities. It was so interesting to learn about the divides not only in the Chicana feminist movement, but other women-of-color feminist movements along the lines of gender vs. nationalism. The idea that choosing to identify with feminist struggles was seen as a desertion of the Chicano cause and choosing to fight for Chicano nationalism was anti-feminist is so problematic because it pits the two against each other and essentially sets up the idea that you have to choose one dominant identity for yourself and that being a woman is inherently un-Chicano and vice versa. Learning about the conference where this all came to a head helped me see this in a tangible way, and hearing about the interviews where people refused to identify as feminists but still touted pretty feminist beliefs really cemented the fact that this problem still exists today, and because of the work we’ve done in class dealing with these intersecting marginalized identities (and because of my own personal experience with that intersectionality) I am better equipped to not only notice it when I see it, but do something to address it.
Oral History
Both theoretically and in practice over the semester, I’ve found that oral histories are invaluable in creating nuanced and multi-dimensional dialogues about history and identity. Over the course of our readings, a common theme emerged regarding groups with intersecting minority identities feeling excluded by the larger social movements they associated with. This reflected itself in the rift between Chicano nationalists and Chicana feminists, and is a dominant dialogue in women-of-color feminism in general. And then even within these smaller groups, there was contention over issues like differences in sexuality or identification. What I took from this is that there are always more and more nuances and differences among people that will be glossed over in a mass movement, and that the only real way to address the effect of these differences is to work on an individual level. No two people will share the same experiences, so they can not truly be completely united under one umbrella cause, so it is important to take into account their own unique experience when discussing the impact of their identities on their lives and on society. Oral history to me seems to be the best way to do that, and after having read Maylei Blackwell’s book, it seems to be a pretty effective tool in examining history and social change as different from the dominant narrative. It is only through listening to actual experiences and looking at the individual that we can really get a sense of the breadth of types of people involved and the diversity even within a seemingly niche group.
There is also something really stirring about interacting with history on such a direct level. After having watched several oral histories and participated in one with Elena Herrada, what stuck with me was how much your perception of events and history can change based on emotion and delivery. Reading about events or learning in class is dry and unaffected compared to listening to a story firsthand, and the emotional and personal impact is much more intense when told directly. Watching how Elena felt about what she was telling us was a really important part of the interview, and it added a whole other dimension to what she was saying. For example, the story about getting her work stolen had a huge impact on her, and it resonated so strongly with me because I could tell how personally it had hurt and upset her. That kind of connection only really happens when you look at things on an individual level, and especially for me as a performer (and therefore a very emotional person), I get a lot more out of things when I can emotionally and personally connect to or at least understand them.
Archiving
The biggest thing I’ve learned about archiving is how difficult it is when you don’t know a lot about the history or topic you’re dealing with. On our visit to the Bentley it seemed like the archivists there are responsible for handling a wide variety of archives and materials, and for deciding what stays and what goes. I realized how absolutely insane that seems when we began sorting through Elena Herrada’s massive archive and had to decide what to keep. Many things seemed important but we had no idea what they pertained to so we kept having to go to Maria for help. Even though we did know quite a bit about her work after having conducted the interviews, and about the history of Chicanos in Michigan through our readings and discussions, it was still really difficult to know exactly what to put in the final archive. I can’t even imagine how difficult it must be for people working in bigger archives with more diverse topics to do the same thing, since they can’t all be experts on everything. It gave me a new appreciation for the work they do to give researchers and history buffs a little taste of individual, personal stories right from the source.
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