Performing Memory in Latin America

The Borda Hospital is a mental hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The murals were part of the effort to take better care of the mentally ill. People were attempting to de-institutionalize the mental hospital. The cultural center was built to improve the patients’ stays at the hospital.  Patients are given the opportunity in the cultural center to express themselves through art and music. They put murals up and made radio broadcasting, baking, and herb growing available to the patients to help with the therapy. The art covers the walls and adds color to a usually dreary setting. Usually people think of hospitals and gray and sad. In April 2013, the Mayor ordered the police to control protestors who were fighting against the shutdown of part of the hospital. The incident became violent, and the police ended up injuring hospital workers. The irony is that usually people think of the mentally ill as violent and dangerous. This is why they get put in institutions. But the real violen...

Modern graffiti originated in Philadelphia during the 1960s. However, people have been leaving a mark and their name on walls and buildings since the early ages of human civilization. In France in 1968, a student revolt occurred in Paris and the working class joined in on the protest. Political graffiti was put up all over the city. One of the original graffiti artists was Corn Bread in Philadelphia during the beginning. He originally started writing his name on walls to make a mark and the idea spread rapidly once it reached the news. The next big place is spread was New York City. During the 1970s, hip hop was forming and graffiti was becoming a major art form. Taki 183 was a graffiti artist that popularized name graffiti when an article in the NYC newspaper made him go viral. T Kid is another graffiti artist during this time period. Much of the graffiti was found in the Bronx because this was where hip hop originated and also the poorest area of NYC. However, the idea spread to ot...

In the song “Latinoamerica,” the singer says that “he is the peasant working hard for your consumption” in verse 1. He is remembering the time when he was working under the harsh conditions and weather. He represents all of the Latin American culture. His backbone is represented by the Andes Mountains in South America. References to Maradona vs England, Cuba, and the Caribbean Sea are made to represent that he stands for more than one country. The chorus shows that he is one with the land and that nature and culture cannot be bought. Both are things that just appear. In verse 3, he shows that is content and happy with what he has. Verse 4 mentions the Coca plant used to make coffee which is found in South America. It also mentions the sugar cane industry in Cuba and the rituals. He is about the natural production of plants. He represents Latin American pride and is reflecting on the memories of colonization of these lands. At the end, he says “you can’t buy my life,” meaning he is not...

Rebel Diaz gave a great performance last Friday and an interesting workshop before the concert. I found it interesting that they used the workshop to tell us about the history of hip hop, the Bronx, and growing up in Chicago. I expected something completely different and that was a great surprise. They were very well informed on the topic. They talked about hip hop being a cultural memory for people growing up in the Bronx. Groups of all ages would get together, listen to music, and dance. The dancing gets passed down through generations and is a combination of many different dances. I thought it was cool that hip hop was not just focused on a small age group and was a mix of a bunch of different cultures coming together in NYC. Their whole workshop was based on memory. Some of the workshop consisted of the two brothers looking back on their time in New York and growing up in Chicago. RodStarz shared the how was once one of the infamous B boys. The brothers told us about the communi...

Rebel Díaz is a hip hop group from the Bronx. The group is made up of two brothers: Rodrigo Venegas and Gonzalo Venegas. Rodrigo’s nickname is RodStarz. Gonzalo’s nickname is G1. They are Chilean. Their parents immigrated from Chile during the military dictatorship in the 1970s. Previously the group was made up of four members: the brothers, Lah Tere and DJ Illanoiz. Many of their songs are a mostly in English with some Spanish mixed in. The group uses their songs for activism and protesting political and social injustices. Many of their lyrics show their support for the counter-hegemonic people and groups. Many examples of this can be found in their song “Which Side are You On.” In this song, they collaborated with  other hip hop artists to show that the black and latinx communities are on the same side. This song is a remix of the original “Which Side are You On,” which was created to protest miners rights in the 1930s. They have a performed at concerts, an immigration rights ...

After listening to a compilation of the songs that comes up when you look up Nueva Canción on Youtube, I can understand how this type of music helped to spark a movement in Chile during this time of unrest when the Chilean government was ruled by the wealthy elite and a military dictatorship during the 1960s and 1970s. The music is very moving and makes you want to dance. The lyrics are also very interesting and talk about a united people, the social unrest, and unfair treatment of the poor. The music and art shaped the culture during this period of unjust treatment of the peasants by the wealthy landowners and the rise of a democracy. It was used to provide hope for the people of Chile who were not being treated well. Although many artists had important roles in the New Song Movement, Violeta Parra was an important figure in this movement because she shifted the music from folklore to writing music that talked about the lives of the common people. Many other artists looked up to her ...

In the introduction to the MayX class, Performing Memory in Latin America, we looked at the articles “Funes de Memorious” by Jorge Luis Borges and “Communicative and Cultural Memory” by Jan Assman. In the “Funes de Memorious,” the narrator discusses a man named Funes and his special gift. The narrator, originally from Argentina, meets Funes when he is growing up with him in Fray Bentos, Uruguay during the late 1880s. Funes had an accident that left him paralyzed and bed ridden. He is left with the ability to remember everything. This included the names of constellations and the ability to learn many languages. Funes has even come up with his own number system. The problem with this number system is that it uses words that are already associated with specific things in the english language. He is not truly creating a new language. The community already recognizes these words. No one can understand his language because he is the only one who knows how it works. The narrator realizes to...