Part II: How the radical lesbian Wicca-practicing “Chicana” feminist scholar is NOT like my grandmother
As I have stated before, there is a tendency amongst more educated Mexican-American middle class scholars to elevate the indigenous hertiage of Mexico over and above the “Hispanic” Catholic elements that have historically been more dominant. Pre-Columbian Mexico is seen as a paradise of pluralism, paganism and proto-feminism that was destroyed by Cortes and his merry band of male chauvinist pigs. In their minds as well, there has always been “resistance” to the destruction of the indigenous religion by the Catholic Church, and such images and practices as the Virgin of Guadalupe and folk healing known as curanderismo were encoded messages that passed on the true pagan faith from generation to generation. The radical feminist scholar, Gloria Anzaldua, wrote in this regard that the task of the “Chicana” (radical Mexican-American woman desperately seeking tenure) was to skip over her parent’s generation of “assimilation” towards the generation of the grandmothers, who through their being able to cure the evil eye with an egg are deemed to be secret pagans worshipping the Aztec mother goddess.
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