Octavio Paz & a narrative of cultural identity in a world of crushing homogeneity.
Premise: "The history of Mexico is the history of man seeking his parentage, his origins."
An active participant in this exercise upon examining the first chapter of The Labyrinth of Solitude should demonstrate how a narrative structure (below) is applied, by the ability to distinguish the following parts of a narrative and apply these to appropriate sections of the chapter.
Describe the story that Paz relates in this chapter:
Then summarize the parts of the, pages 9-28, in order to arrange them as a narrative in the following order:
1 through 7 below.
Here are the apparent stages in every narrative:
stage the question it answers? Section of the chapter
3. The main event –what this narrative is about
4.The purpose –what is achieved; what it means
5. The wind-down –events that end the process
6. The result –the final context of the events (embedding)
7. The later consequences, or moral, or lesson:
Now discuss your description of main event with those of your group's members.
The Pachuco as symbol of adolescent growth to adulthood is the main event?
Used by Paz as bridging device between adolescent growing to an adult and the dispalced person finding himself in an alien culture (Pachuco in the southern USA) and as a chance to describe Mexican & US cultural differences.
The meaning is "In every person there is the possibility of us . . .becoming -once again- another person."
M 27, Octavio Paz, LABYRINTH OF SOLITUDE, pp. 9-29, See: Analyze Chapter One: exercise in class. pp. 9-29,
W 29, Octavio Paz, Mexican Masks pp, 29-46.
F 31, Dia de los Muertos – attend the celebration at Cornell Patio, Monday afternoon!
Essay due on Slavery’s consequences–Du Bois, Walcott, Kincaid, Mintz, & others.
November
M 3, Octavio Paz, Day of the Dead - pp. 47-64. & attend the celebration at Cornell Patio, Monday afternoon, 4:00-5:00 PM!
W 5, Paz on Colonialism & Catholicism, pp. 89-116.
F 7, Octavio Paz as a mirror on Mexico & the Indies - Paz, Revolt 1820 to Revolution 1910, pp.117-150.
Mexican Masks pp, 29-46.