Invisible and Voiceless
The Struggle of Mexican Americans for Recognition, Justice, and Equality
by
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In order to understand the historical, social, and psychological culture of Mexicans and Mexican Americans, we must return to Spain’s conquest of the Americas. Its invasion of Mexico led by Hernan Cortes in the year 1521 resulted in an indigenous holocaust and the clash of two cultures: the old Mexican Aztec culture and the Western European Spanish culture; the new Mexican culture was forged out of violence and bloodshed. Without understanding the traumatic events that occurred during the Mexican conquest, we cannot understand the nature of our historical past.
Every culture—even those with no written language—preserves an oral history in the form of religion, myths, and legends. The destruction of Mexico’s history by the Spaniards left the inhabitants of the area with an obscured and blurry understanding of their past. Today in the United States, most young Mexican Americans know very little about their ancient history. During the 1960s and 1970s, there was a renewed interest in ancient Mesoamerican culture, which taught our people about Mexico’s past. Today some Mexican Americans feel that young people no longer have to be as concerned about the past; therefore, many of our children are no longer searching for our historical roots, our raíces.
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About the Book
INVISIBLE & VOICELESS: The Struggle of Mexican Americans for Recognition, Justice, and Equality traces the vicious history of the European conquest of the Americas and examines its pervasive impact on Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants today. Author Martha Caso sheds light on events often ignored or glossed over by history textbooks, from the holocaust and enslavement of native peoples at the hands of European conquerors to the Mexican–American War of 1848 to modern efforts by extremists to fan the flames of racism and xenophobia.
The reverberations of the European invasion still echo today, and it is impossible to understand the current issues of poverty and racism without understanding their origins. Historically, Mexican Americans have wielded very little social and political power, and recent xenophobic laws only serve to stoke the fires of hatred and antagonism and further erode their rights. INVISIBLE & VOICELESS offers Mexican Americans an opportunity to learn more about their history and their relationship with the United States and Mexico.
Caso’s hope is that once they understand their past, Mexican Americans will find their collective voice and stand up for their rights—that they will cease to be invisible and voiceless in America.
About the Author
Martha Caso studied pre-Columbian and Latin American history and archaeology at the University of Texas at San Antonio, where she also earned a master’s degree in Latin American and Spanish literature. A native Texan, Caso’s writing is influenced by her personal experience of growing up poor in a Mexican American community.