MexiTexas, Culture & The Idea of Home...

Well, what is authentic culture, anyway? Is it related to place? Race (geographic "racial" groupings differ from one another only in about 6% of their genes. This means that there is greater variation within "racial" groups than between them)? Customs, or religion? Old, or new like Dubai? Language? Culture is a living breathing thing and some guy half-way around the world wants to put me facing Mexico.

Have you ever played Risk?  If you have, then perhaps you might agree that the possibility of the U.S. breaking up is out there.  It is hard to control all. One Russian predicts that my part of the country will become the Republic of Texas, part of Mexico, in 2010, based on a cultural/economic divide. If you look at this old ethnographic map of the indigenous North America, at left, (in Princeton's library), it makes sense but c'mon.  The Deep South in this territory, too?  Look at the Russian's map in his WSJ article.  He thinks the financial, economic and other woes will spur a divide in our country. Russia gets Alaska, the West goes to China, etc.

Hot topic: “cultural knowledge,” “ethnographic intelligence,” and “human terrain mapping” has been deemed as essential to military exercises but the anthropologists are against this "Human Terrain System".  This is a recent topic in USA Today and, when I sat in on a recent meeting at Santa Fe's School for American Research, this topic from 2008 was a hot one, too. Culture is related to power, to hegemony.

Unlike most Americans, I've roamed around (a majority of Americans have moved regionally at least once in their lives, now nearly four in 10 have not left their home towns).  I know that culture begins in the home; the idea of home defines place.  No wonder the War on Terror defined the enemies as everywhere and we had our country renamed The Homeland.  Si, MexiTexas?

Comments

[anthony]

Lines are constantly redrawn all over the world. However Texas ws alredy part of Mexico once and I don't think they could do much with them. However, maybe Mexico should be part of Texas.

[carron e.]

I listened to this discussed on talk radio last night on the way home from work. Because Americans are so mobile, there are Virginians in New Mexico,etc. Cross culturization. I think the recent job losses will force people out of their comfort zone (state) and into whatever state offers a jobs. More cross culturization. Living in a state filled with Mexican immigrants, I know it can tax the system. Hard to blame them, though, for wanting something better for their families; ie. healthcare, education, opportunities. But, who to pay for this? Being a Texas transplant to our beautiful, bordering state New Mexico, by choice, I have emphatically tell you...it was culture shock. People constantly ask me where I am from because of my east Texas accent...like I was from Mongolia! I am constantly referred to as the "Texas girl", Southern Belle,etc. Texas=conservative, and damn proud of it! New Mexico=Liberal, and damn proud of it! The flowers in your garden are totally different. No dress up. No big hair. Like me, New Mexicans are VERY conscious of the environment. Native American culture. Hispanic culture. The people are not like Texans and it is our bordering state. When people move to New Mexico...they become New Mexicans and start to love and blend in to this incredible place. I am jumping around but just to point out, you don't have to cross the country to find a TOTALLY different culture. The South is the South and always will be. Mexico is filled with poverty and corruption and is a drug freeway. No one will want to take that on in Texas or anywhere else.

[Kay Dennison]

Since I work for the Hispanic Center in our county, I do understand. We are blessed because we don't have the gang/drug problem with them . . . yet. Our clients are working poor -- I spent an hour on the phone Wednesday calling all the businesses that I could think of that hire Hispanics for a young man who needs a job without success. It's the post holiday slowdown and I felt sorry for him.

I know why these people come here from my work with them. There are things going on in Latin America that most people in the U.S. don't understand. The things I discover when I do research for my boss horrify me.

I wish there was a solution.

[Marianna Scheffer]

I just finished a book called Manifest Destinies: the Making of the Mexican American race, by Laura E. Gomez. She sorts out the racial dynamics of New Mexico, which are different from those in, say, Texas, or anywhere else in the country. Worth a read if you have the time.