University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository American Studies ETDs Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2-9-2011 Ghostly I(s)/Eyes: The orF mation of Subjectivity in Mexican American Life Narratives Patricia Marie Perea Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/amst_etds Recommended Citation Perea, Patricia Marie. "Ghostly I(s)/Eyes: The orF mation of Subjectivity in Mexican American Life Narratives." (2011). https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/amst_etds/34 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Electronic Theses and Dissertations at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in American Studies ETDs by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. i ii © 2010, Patricia Marie Perea iii DEDICATION por mi familia The smell of cedar can break the feed yard. Some days I smell nothing until she opens her chest. Her polished nails click against tarnished metal Cleek! Then the creek of the hinge and the memories open, naked and total. There. A satin ribbon curled around a ringlet of baby fine hair. And there. A red and white tassel, its threads thick and tangled. Look here. She picks up a newspaper clipping, irons out the wrinkles between her hands. I kept this. We remember this. It is ours. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Until quite recently, I did not know how many years ago this dissertation began. It did not begin with my first day in the Ph.D. program at the University of New Mexico in 2000. Nor did it begin with my first day as a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin in 1997. It began in my earliest memories – the smell of cinnamon in arroz con leche, the lonely sound of trains in the middle of the llano night, the rusty color of harvested cottonfields. My dissertation is a story of ghosts and memory. It is a story of familia. Sin familia, nothing is possible, and I am grateful to every single member of my family, living or dead. First and foremost, I thank my mom. Her stories of Del Rio and our family‘s move north to the Texas Panhandle continue to inspire me. I hope someday I‘ll write stories worthy of her experience. There were many days when a phone call to my mom saved me from absolute panic and self-doubt. My brother Adrian is also a crucial presence in this work. Adrian heard my first stories. His patience and his enthusiasm during our many long road trips through Texas‘ rural highways helped me understand the significance of geography and landscape. Then there is las palabras. If the llano of West Texas and Eastern New Mexico has held my heart, then words have helped me write my heart. For these words and for my love of words, I thank my dad. My dad did not read books to me as much as he told me stories and sang me songs. Our many drives between Canyon and Friona, Friona and Lubbock, Albuquerque and Mesilla were thick with stories of cowboys, unruly horses and loyal dogs. Because of my dad, I learned to appreciate the rhythms of Johnny Cash, Hank Williams and Waylon Jennings. My grandparents, Jacobo and Dominga Perea are the absent presences in the soul of everything I have ever done or will ever do. My earliest memories are my grandparents. Their stories of Dilia, Anton Chico and Las Vegas always show me the way home. I would also like to thank my Uncle James and his family. Austin was a huge change for me and their presence and support during those years are priceless. Uncle James helped me change flat tires, took me out to dinner and perhaps, most importantly, engaged in long discussions about classic rock. I am so fortunate to have a large and supportive network of family and friends. I am grateful to every single member of this network. In particular, I would like to thank my Aunt Irma for encouraging me with her listening for all the years I have been alive. I would also like to thank my Uncle Joe and my Uncle David for their limitless support and their willingness to move me across Texas time and time again. My grandparents Viola Lomas and Juan Alonzo are also a significant presence in this work. Their stories have inspired my future projects and I hope my next projects will do justice to their stories and experiences. I would also like to thank Blanca Elia, Polly Donez and Camille Rodríguez. They adopted me into their family and provided me with all the comforts of home and family when I needed them most. My friends and colleagues have also supported and sustained me during many nights when I was ready to walk away from this dissertation and graduate school in general. Lavinia Nicolae and Verónica Calvillo listened patiently to every moment of v self-doubt and always provided me with balance. Eric Castillo, Lena McQuade and Andrea Mays were with me throughout this Ph.D. endeavor and I know our conversations informed my work, sustained my work and helped bring it to fruition. Charlene Johnson taught me to write about family is to write about truth always. Erika T. Wurth provided me with so much perspective and insight regarding my writing and my work. Becky Castillo offered strength in some of my weakest and hardest moments. I know someday she will be an amazing profesora. I would also like to thank my oldest friend, Jennifer Byrd-Craven. We made it from kindergarten to graduate school together, and she offered so much support during all levels of my education. At every step of this process are wonderful advisors, professors and committee members. Professor A. Gabriel Meléndez has patiently supported me throughout this very long process and helped me to make my arguments stronger and clearer. His work at the University of New Mexico as a writer, a critic and a professor brought me to the study of autobiography. Professor José E. Limón gave me my first opportunities in graduate school at the University of Texas. Until my first semester in Professor Limón‘s graduate seminar, I had no idea Mexican American literature existed. In his courses, I realized the strength and beauty of Mexican America in the United States. I am forever grateful to Professor Limón. Professor Michael L. Trujillo and Professor Rebecca Schreiber have consistently supported me in the writing of this project and I appreciate their willingness to continue to read and comment on my work as the years passed. I also thank Professor Jesse Alemán who is an incredible editor and a wonderful instructor. His comments on early versions of my dissertation proposal and abstract shaped the trajectory of this work. I am also grateful to Dr. Tobias Durán at the Center for Regional Studies. Without the generous funding of the Center for Regional Studies, this project would not have been possible. Finally, there are layers. Words write the memories. Memories saturate the heart. Annette, you helped me find my heart. vi vii GHOSTLY I(S)/EYES: THE FORMATION OF SUBJECTIVITY IN MEXICAN AMERICAN LIFE NARRATIVES by Patricia Marie Perea B.A. ENGLISH AND HISTORY M.A. ENGLISH PH.D. AMERICAN STUDIES ABSTRACT Autoethnography is the genre through which many marginalized groups write back to hegemony (Pratt 1992, 7). It is no wonder then that one of the modes in which Mexican Americans choose to express themselves and represent their communities is autoethnography. However, the study of Mexican American autoethnography reveals a more complicated dynamic occurring in its formation. This dynamic goes beyond binary constructions such as periphery (Mexican Americans) versus center (Euroamerican) to illuminate the shifting structure of Mexican American history as well as the shifting structure of Mexican American subjectivity. I argue Mexican American life narratives use autoethnographic methods to inform their life narratives. Additionally, I argue Mexican American autoethnographic life narratives use ghosts as a medium through which to address the formation of Mexican America. One reason Mexican American life narratives employ ghosts is because in many instances, but not all, ghostly bodies signify the dead. ―The dead . and their relations are perhaps the most lawless, unruly, and potentially revolutionary inhabitants of any imagined territory, national or otherwise‖ (Holland 2000, 23). While I believe that to exact a mode of revolutionary resistance is one of the reasons the dead, their ghosts and viii hauntings make their presences felt in the narratives of marginalized peoples in the United States, I also argue that these ghostly presences menace not only dominant society, but ―other‖ societies as well. The ghosts of the U.S.-México border disturb the dominant narrative of the United States. They disrupt binaries between México and the United States by bringing to light contradictory desires that many present-day Mexican Americans would like to ignore. These desires make their presence known here and in each case the Mexican American autobiographer uses the ghost or absent presence of the ghost to illuminate the gap between the formation of Mexican American subjectivity as a unifying force and the formation of Mexican-American subjectivity as the fragmented force it often is. My dissertation addresses not only the fragmentation of Mexican American subjectivity, but also locates its productive potential and reveals what our haunted life narratives add to the study of our América. ix TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................... XII PREFACE ..................................................................................................................... XIII INTRODUCTION: ........................................................................................................... 1 RE-MEMBER THE ALAMO: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MOMENT ................. 1 I. THE GHOST AND ME ..................................................................................................... 1 II. RE-MEMBERED GHOSTS AND ABSENT HISTORIES ........................................................ 6 III.