Aztlan and Viet Nam: Chicano and Chicana Experiences of the War

by George Mariscal (Editor)

Overview

Showcasing over sixty short stories, poems, speeches, and articles, Aztlán and Viet Nam is the first anthology of Mexican American writings about the U.S. war in Southeast Asia. The words are startlingly frank, moving, and immensely powerful, as they call to our attention an important and neglected part of U.S. history. Gathered from many little-known sources, the works reflect both the soldiers' experience and the antiwar movement at home. Taken together, they illustrate the contradictions faced by the traditionally patriotic Mexican American community, and show us the war and the grassroots opposition to it from a new perspective—one that goes beyond the familiar dichotomy of black and white America.

George Mariscal offers critical introductions and provides historical background by identifying specific issues which have not been widely discussed in relation to the war, noting, for example, the potential for Chicano soldiers to recognize their own ethnic and class identities in those of the Vietnamese people. Drawing upon interviews with key participants in the National Chicano Moratorium Committee, Mariscal analyzes the antiwar movement, the Catholic Church, traditional Mexican American groups, and an emerging feminist consciousness among Chicanas.

Also included are personal accounts: Norma Elia Cantú's remembrance of her brother who died in combat, Bárbara Renaud González's evocative poem about Chicanas on the homefront, Alberto Ríos's and Naomi Helena Quiñonez's moving poetry about the Wall, and the recollections of Abelardo Delgado and others on the August 29, 1970 Moratorium.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520214057
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	03/01/1999
Series:	American Crossroads , #4
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	337
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

George Mariscal is Associate Professor of Literature at the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of the award-winning Contradictory Subjects: Quevedo, Cervantes, and Seventeenth-Century Spanish Culture (1991). The grandson of Mexican immigrants, he was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1968 and served the following year in Viet Nam.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Aztlan and Viet Nam

Part 1 / STANDING AT THE WALL
Introduction

1 Jose Morante, "Corrido del padre de un soldado"
2 Magdaleno Avila (Juan Valdez), "My Uncle Sam"
and "Sea of Freedom"
3 Pedro Ortiz Vasquez, "Las cartas de Martin Flores"
4 Robert Perea, "Dragon Mountain"
j Joe Rodriguez, from The Oddsplayer
6 Pedro B. Anchondo, "Lonely Vietnam"
7 Leroy V. Qyintana, from Interrogations
8 Daniel Cano, "Somewhere Outside Due Pho"
9 Daniel Cano, from Shifting Loyalties
1O Francisco Javier Munguia M., from A Mexican
in Vietnam
11 Roy Benavidez, from Medal of Honor: A Vietnam
Warriors Story
12 Everett Alvarez, Jr., with Anthony S. Pitch,
from Chained Eagle
13 Ignacio M. Garda, "Unfinished Letter to Terry"
14 Patricio Paiz, "En memoria de Arturo Tijerina"
and "Get It On"
15 " Juan Ramirez, from "History of a Chicano
Vietnam Veteran"
16 Charley Trujillo, from Soldados: Chicanos in VietNam
17 Charley Trujillo, from Dogs from Illusion
18 Michael W. Rodriguez, "Party on the Mountain"
19 Jacinto Reyes, from "The Tortilla Mission"
20 Ralph Molina, "Dos Recuerdos"
21 Ricardo Mario Amezquita, "I Just Got Back from
Vietnam, Baby"
22 Saul Sanchez, "El entierro"
23 Luis Omar Salinas, "Death in Vietnam"
24 Norma Elia Cantu, from Canicula: Snapshots of
a Girlhood en Ia Frontera
25" Tomas M. Calderon, "Untitled"
20 Carmen Tafolla, "La siembra," and from "Los Corts"
27 Mushroom Montoya, "'Too many targets, too high
a body count'"

Part 2 / RAZA si, GUERRA NO!
Introduction

28 Robert Barron, "Viet Nam Veteran"
29 RosaHo Mufioz, "Speech Refusing Induction"
30 Anonymous, "Corrido de la guerra"
31 Elias Hruska y Cortez, "Rocket Flight"
32 Anonymous, "Little Girls"
33 Gina Valdes, "Hearts on Fire" and "Heroes"
34 Barbara Renaud Gonzalez, "The Summer of
Vietnam"
35" Arturo Silvano Bobian, "My Cousin Ralph"
36 Luis Valdez, from "Pensamiento serpentine"
37 Marfa Herrera-Sobek, "Cinco poemas"
38 Adrian Vargas, "Blessed Amerika"
39 Ben Reyes, "Juan Carlos Gonzalez"
40 Proceso R. Montoya, Jr., "Poema"
41 Anonymous, "A Qgestion Every Chicano
Should Ask"
42 Anonymous (A soldier de la Raza, overseas),
"Carnal in Vietnam"
43 Anonymous, "Vietnam: Gabacho's War"
44 Portilla de la Luz, "La hora de todos"
45 Alejandro Negrete, "Chicano Moratorium,
December 20, 1969"
46 Dorinda Guadalupe Moreno, "La nifia Lina en
East Los Angeles"
47 Tino Villanueva, "Chicano Is an Act ofDefiance"
48 Carlos Conde, "Eulogy for Ruben Salazar"
49 Enrique Hank Lopez, "Overkill at the Silver Dollar"
50 Delfino Varela, "A Walk in the Sun"
51 Patricia Rodriguez, "Chicano Moratorium"
52 Katarina Davis del Valle, "Song to a Thousand
Faces/My People in the Streets"
53 Abelardo Delgado, "Due Process ofLaw"
54 Roberto Rodriguez, from Assault with a Deadly
Weapon
55 Luis J. Rodriguez, from Always Running: La vida loca,
Gang Days in L.A.
56 Lucha Corpi, from Delia's Song
57 Rick Browne, "Young Chicano's Death Described"
(on Moratorium of January 30, 1971)
58 Alberto Rios, "The Vietnam Wall"
59 Naomi Helena Qgifionez, "America's Wailing Wall"
60 Enrique R. Lamadrid, "Enemy Way"
61 Gregg Barrios, "Chale Guerra"
62 Trinidad Sanchez, Jr., "A time to raise questions"

Epilogue: Treinta afios despues
(Thirty years later)
Notes
Sources