MOVING TOWARD INDIGENOUS SELF-REPRESENTATION
Like John Beverley, Analisa Taylor sees testimonio as a genre of transition, in which non-indigenous spokespeople play a positive role in the struggle for indigenous rights. She discusses the role of the “non-indigenous interlocutor” in the last chapter of her dissertation. Yet it seems condescending to assert, as does Taylor, that the intervention of a white
intellectual is essential for transmitting the message or, as she puts it, that “[i]n order for disenfranchised people to tell their versions of history to a civil society of readers who might take an interest in their struggles, they must gain the ear of well-connected, urban
intellectuals who can shape their stories into a narrative frame that will assure their appeal to a now transnational cosmopolitan audience” (284). There must be at least some indigenous individuals who can fulfill this intermediary function as well. Nonetheless, the fact that none have emerged at the national level suggests that significant change is still required with respect to cultural production and indigenous communities.
Taylor does recognize that testimonio’s essential paradox is that it “undermines the very distinction between writing subject and referent or object of representation at the same time that it reinscribes it” (268). This criticism is valid and also strikingly similar to well known objections raised by critics of late examples of indigenismo. Indigenista authors go to considerable lengths to present themselves as well informed “insiders” with respect to
indigenous cultures, to give a more credible perspective in their work and in a sense minimize distance between themselves and their characters. But as critics have shown repeatedly, they ultimately fall into the very trap of patriarchy that they decry. Even if the mechanism for literary production is altered, the same can be argued about testimonio authors. While it is rarely stated directly, criticism of texts about Indians produced by non- Indians is really about power. There is power inherent in the speaking voice of a literary work, but much more so in authorship, specifically in the ability to make decisions about what to include or omit, how to organize materials and what to emphasize or deemphasize, among others. Again, Beverley argues that testimonio is a “fundamentally democratic and egalitarian form of narrative” (Against Literature 75), but this is an overestimation of the changes in power structure offered by the genre, in my view. Testimonio maintains and perhaps even perpetuates the same pattern of indigenista patriarchy, with most decisions remaining in non-indigenous hands. No matter how benevolent a non-indigenous author’s intentions, in both indigenismo and testimonio s/he always has the potential to wield more power than the indigenous referents in the work.
Since at least the 1980s, critics have heralded the increasing emergence of texts produced by indigenous people themselves, or literatura indígena, as a remedy for this situation. In fact, indigenous authors in Mexico have published quite a number of texts in the last two decades, particularly poems and short stories, but also video, theater and some long fiction. Many of these publications have been under the auspices of nationally known mestizo academic and literary figures, however, such as Miguel Leon-Portilla, Carlos Montemayor and Carlos Lenkersdorf, who have published compilations and translations of indigenous texts for non-indigenous audiences. These sponsors should be lauded for opening
75
channels of communication for indigenous authors and exposing new audiences to marginalized voices in Mexico. Yet paradoxically, by placing themselves at the center of their projects and using their own name recognition, these promoters of indigenous voices in a sense also reinforce the patriarchal patterns of indigenismo. Taylor describes this
continuing cycle as it has occurred with the Zapatista movement and its well known spokesman Subcommander Marcos: “Ironically, Marcos’s protagonism in the Zapatista struggle has itself served to reinforce this notion that indigenous peoples cannot ‘speak truth to power’ for themselves, but must rely on a non-indigenous interlocutor to do so” (280). Like indigenista authors, nobody doubts spokespeople’s positive intentions and concern for indigenous groups, but perhaps unavoidably, they too seem to reinforce the old pattern of inequity and dependence.
Another problem is that even with increased production by and promotion of
indigenous authors, audiences continue to be limited to mostly academic and regional circles. The average Mexican cannot name a single contemporary indigenous author, director or artist, and this is in spite of an indigenous minority population thatin Mexico represents a larger percentage than the African American population in the United States. Taylor points out that mediation by non-indigenous intellectuals and also the State continue to impede Indian self-expression:
I posit that while many indigenous and non-indigenous writers are creating spaces for their work in which they might rearticulate what it means to be indigenous, and Mexican, in Mexico in more dignified terms, the production of images and discourses of indigenous identity has continued to be
conditioned by mediation by non-indigenous intellectuals and state institutions. (267)
Many critics have noted that mediation in cultural production in Mexico is closely tied to longstanding class distinctions and privilege, which are unlikely to crumble on their own. In
the final analysis, it is indigenous groups and authors themselves who must bring about change. Though they face enormous challenges of all kinds, indigenous communities must write, promote, read and study more native literary texts, from their own group and others. Furthermore, they must seek national and international audiences for their work without mediating agents.
In Against Literature, Beverley points out how important the development of a national literature was to the formation of the modern European nation-state, and a parallel most certainly can be made to indigenous struggles for autonomy in Mexico. He essentially argues that literary expression does not follow once sovereignty has been achieved, but rather is an integral part of the struggle for autonomy itself. Literature is and always has been closely linked to identity and collective power. Literary texts can even function as stimuli for struggles for autonomy, since they give people concrete representations of culture with high symbolic value, or easily accessible and reproducible “grails” around which to reinforce cultural boundaries. When a member of a historically oppressed community succeeds in breaking down barriers, such as publishing a successful literary work that is widely read both inside and outside the community, the symbolic value to that group is tremendous. Given that identity is constructed and constantly evolving, “organic” literary works are fundamental to group identity. Not only can a literary text serve to preserve or rescue traditional cultural practices, but in today’s world, the fact that an author achieves economic success and notoriety can be an important political rallying point as well.