I'm Proud of my Native American Heritage
By Salvador Moreno
I grew up thinking of myself as just a Mexican. I saw society as turning away from me and all of my people. I saw the poverty and the youth killing each other and nothing was done to stop it. Although I valued Mexican people and was proud of being one, other people didn't feel the same way.
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?Then when I was in the 8th grade my big brother, who was getting involved in an indigenous Mexican group, brought home a bunch of stickers. They said, "Mexican! Not Latino. Latinos are the white people of Latin America. Not Hispanic. Hispanics are the people of Spain, Europeans." I really didn't care, I thought it was a bunch of bull, but still I took a bunch to my school and handed them out to my friends. My friends thought the stickers were fresh and agreed with the message. I started to think about what the stickers said. I didn't ever care to think about labels, but it's the way you're defined as a race. I started to wonder what being Mexican was all about, besides eating the food and listening to the music. I wondered why my people prefer to call themselves anything but Mexican. Why are we taught to believe that lighter skin is better? And what was this whole thing about the anti-immigrant proposition, Prop. 187? And most importantly, how did we get in this condition that our people can't succeed and get no encouragement to succeed? I found out about my history One day I tagged along with my big brother to an event held by the Chicano Mexicano Mexica Empowerment Committee. I was young. I thought I had no interest in history, so I really didn't pay any attention to the presentation. After attending different events, I began to listen. For the first time, I felt comfortable listening to history, a history that was mine, I guess because my whole life I had only been taught the history of Europeans. I learned that Latinos are the descendants of the Europeans (Portuguese, Spaniards and the French) of Latin America. Hispanics are the people who belong to Spain. Although most of us have some white blood (that was raped into us), have Spanish surnames and speak Spanish, that does not make us Spaniards. Compare the situation of Mexicans with African Americans. African Americans have some white blood, have British surnames, and speak English but they don't consider themselves Englishmen or Euro-Afros. We Mexicans and Central Americans are descendants of Mexica (pronounced Meh-shee-kah), our last great civilization before the arrival of Europeans. That's where the mispronounced terms Mexican, Mexicano, and Chicano come from. I learned that back in 1800 B.C. we had a great civilization called the Olmecas, the mother civilization of us all. They are known for their colossal heads sculptured of basalt and their huge pyramids and their agricultural developments. Later in about 600 B.C. the Zapotecs built Monte Alban, a city with a pyramid on a mountain. The Teotihuacanos flourished around 200 B.C. They built one of the greatest cities, Teotihuacan, as well as the famous Pyramid of the Sun, the Pyramid of the Moon, temples and palaces. In 100 B.C. came the Maya. They were known for their beautiful architecture, hieroglyphic writing, dozens of cities, having the most accurate calendar even more accurate than the one we use today and inventing the mathematical concepts of zero and decimal point. |
Letters about this article: ?Dear Editor, I want to comment on the article "I am proud of my native heritage" by Salvador Moreno. This article helped me understand what being a proud Mexican is all about. I agree with the message, "Mexican! Not Latino. Latinos are the white people of Latin America. Not Hispanic. Hispanics are the people of Spain, Europeans." What it says is very true. We are a whole different people and it's time that everybody else knows it. I also agree that there is a lot of discrimination against Mexicans and all the Latinos. I went to a school in Mexico for many years. I learned about Pancho Villa, Emiliano Zapato and Miguel Hidalgo but I haven't learned about the Olmecas, Zapotecs, Mayas, etc. and the European invasions. This made me realize what we are and what we have to fight for. I hope that more Mexicans and Latinos learn about their native heritage and be proud of them instead of killing each other. --Francisco Munez, Chatsworth High Dear Editor, I am so proud of this little brother. I strongly agree with his views regarding his heritage and why it is kept from us. Those of us who know the truth about our position politically and religiously as Indians recognize that All First Nation peoples are a threat to the advancement of European ideals on this land... No high school or elementary school ever reviewed what happened to our people, why it happened and what has been done to reverse those effects. Moreno knows and his efforts should be made known. His concern for his race is nothing more than what is expected of a warrior and his point of view, if acted upon, will insure the survival of the Seventh Generation.... So that we may thrive and restore harmony of OUR LAND. --Raul Lima, USC via e-mail [email protected] |
And finally came the Mexica-Aztec in around 1325 A.D. We founded Tenochtitlan, the largest city in the world at the time. There we built great pyramid temples. It was a city of universities, libraries, schools and arts. It was considered the most beautiful city in the world. All of these wonderful civilizations unite us to the Central American and the so-called Native Americans of the South-West because it is our shared Anahuac (Mexican and Central American) history.
By attending more events and reading, I discovered that we had schools and universities for everyone--males and females, nobles and commoners. We had made discoveries in mathematics, geometry, engineering, astronomy and medicine. We developed an agriculture that gave the world chocolate, chili, tomatoes, vanilla, corn, squash and many other foods. We had a just legal system, and one of the great theologies and literatures of the world.
European invasions destroyed our civilizations
The greatness of our people came to a sudden end with the European invasions of our lands. The Spaniards destroyed our cities, burned our libraries, stole our wealth, killed 23 million of our people (95 percent of our population) and enslaved many others. They imposed on us their government, religion, language and branded us with their Spanish surnames as if we were their property. In the end they kept from us our history, land, language and identity, leaving us a "culturally castrated" people, which is what we are today.
Learning this made me feel surprised and angry because I had never heard any of it before. I always wondered why my school's 800-page world history book only had two pages on the entire history of Mexico and Central America.
In my ninth grade history class, we had just finished watching Schindler's List and the teacher made us have six minutes of silence for the six million Jews who died. When my friends and I requested a couple of minutes of silence of the 23 million Mexicans who died, she refused. That made me really angry because she didn't care to acknowledge what happened to us as a people.
I feel real sad when I see Mexican and Central American teens bleaching their hair false blonde and wearing blue or green contacts, wanting to look white. Who do they think they're fooling but themselves? But I guess it's not all their fault. For more than 500 years, we have been taught to identify with Europeans and despise the indigenous people of Anahuac: to despise ourselves. We have also been given the false identities of mestizo, Hispano, Latino and Raza, as a way to keep our true identity and our Mexica history buried.
Although Mexicans and Central Americans are the majority of the so-called Hispanics and Latinos, we see mostly white faces on English and Spanish TV. Whenever we see a brown person, who is one of our people, they are always the servant or the maid. It's giving our people the message that white is better than brown. That is what has brought a lot of ignorance and self-hate to our people.
With all of this history, you would think we would have many cultural centers where we can learn who we are. Every other race seems to have one in L.A. County, but we don't, although we are a larger population than any other race in Los Angeles. Where are our leaders, speaking out for the interest of our people? We have not one.
Since I've been involved in the Mexica movement, my friends and I started a club at Huntington Park HS. We're planning poster campaigns and murals to educate our people on some of the history.
The hardest part has been educating my family. My parents think we're just making all of this up. For those of you who think the same, here are some books on the history of our people. They should be read in the order listed:
Daily Life of the Aztecs by Jacques Soustelle, The Aztecs by Nigel Davies, Mexico: From the Olmecs to the Aztecs by Michael Coe, Mexica Handbook by Olin Tezcatlipocca, and The Aztec World by Elizabeth Hill Boone.
For more information, write to CMMEC at P.O. Box 5088, Huntington Park, CA 90255-9088. Website: http://www.mexica-movement.org.
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