Search Arte Américas

Progress and Backlash

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The growing Hispanic population attracted the attention of markets and politicians, creating both an expansion of businesses and a political backlash. The designation “Mexican” expanded to reflect a diverse “Latino” market.  Immigration and the “Decade of the Hispanic”. The next period was not a continual improvement of the Mexican American/Chicano condition. It was more a steps-forward-steps-back […]

El Movimiento

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The Chicano Civil rights efforts spread in valley fields, in colleges and communities, empowering and inspiring art and culture. Education became the vehicle to lift the community from the fields to new fields of endeavors.   La Causa, The Farmworkers Movement. ¡Ya basta! It started in the fields and spread to the younger generations who were few […]

Seeds of Change

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The next generation of Mexican Americans contributed to the war efforts and started businesses, while new bracero immigrants renewed ties to Mexico and impeded efforts to organize in the fields.  Veterans. The wartimes demonstrated the patriotism of many Mexican-origin families in the U.S. who sent several sons to WWII and during the Korean Conflict in this […]

Al Norte

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Conditions in Mexico and opportunities in El Norte drew Mexicans across the border to work in the fields, railroads and lumber mills, many refugees of the Mexican Revolution. They endured despite hard times.  The Mexican Revolution. The largest number of those coming North left during the Mexican Revolution to enter the life of farmworkers, some settling in valley […]

The Early American Period

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Gold and opportunities brought an invasion of European and Yankee adventurers who transformed the valley into their “Garden of the Sun.” Few Mexicans or natives survived this wild west period fraught with racism.  The Gold Rush. At the same time Mexico signed the Treaty, turning over all their Northern territories, gold was discovered in California, maybe […]

Alta California: The Mexican Period

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“WE DIDN’T CROSS THE BORDER, THE BORDER CROSSED US” After 300 years of colonization, Mexico became independent, inheriting Alta California. Weak from wars and colonization, they lost all northern territories to the advancing, aggressive United States. The large map created for the exhibit by Alvaro Solorio, summarizes these first two periods, including the native populations (in […]

Alta California: The Spanish Period

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El Camino Viejo Spain didn’t send expeditions into the Valley until 1772, to explore and capture natives for the missions. The Valley was home to native peoples, their numbers devastated by Europeans and their diseases. The Spaniards first entered the valley through EL CAMINO VIEJO (the old road). The Spanish had “discovered,” conquered, and colonized much of the […]

Indigenous Sovereignty 

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Like the Indigenous people of the territories we reside on, the people from Oaxaca have maintained Indigenous sovereignty for centuries. Indigenous sovereignty is the will to bring Oaxaqueños together in community. It is also the commitment to shape an Indigenous future on our own terms. In Oaxaca, this has often been through the mechanisms to […]

Indigenous Oaxacan Dialects/Languages

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In California, the most spoken Oaxacan dialects are Mixteco, Zapotec, and Triqui. Of the indigenous Oaxacan population in California, over 50% speak Mixteco, 25% speak Zapoteco, and little less than 10% speak Triqui. Though these indigenous peoples are very closely related historically and geographically, all communities contain unique cultural traits and are distinct from one […]

Food Sovereignty

https://arteamericas.org/food-sovereignty/

Oaxacan Native societies have been passing down the scientific knowledge of agronomy for thousands of years. This science has allowed Oaxacans to domesticate, cultivate, and select the ingredients to prepare their world-renowned foods—modeling a system called food sovereignty. Food sovereignty is the right that people have to control their own local food systems and consume […]