El Paso’s proximity to Juaréz doesn’t just place the two cities’ cultures and histories side by side, but inevitably intertwines them. With a near 80% Hispanic population (United States Census Bureau, 2016), the culture of El Paso has obvious influences from south of the border, but still doesn’t seem entirely Mexican, nor American; in elements of its food, its art, its architecture, and its people, there is evident a hybridization of the two countries, combining and affecting each other to create an entirely new culture, representative of both (Canclini, 1995). Arguments about the culture at the U.S./Mexico border have emphasized that it should not simply be described as ‘the uncomplicated synthesis of two bounded (but always inherently unequal) cultures’ (Yépez summarized in Reimer, 2011, p.3). Rather, the distinct cultural and artistic outputs of the borderlands function as reflections of the complex and tense political and social relationship between the U.S. and Mexico (Ibid.). This is an observable fact in examining the art and culture of El Paso, its full name El Paso del Norte (The Pass to the North), and the distinct socio-political issues embedded in its current and historic position as a gateway to the upper Americas.
CULTURAL PRODUCTION & RESILIENCE
in the borderlands
The term ‘border art’ is used to ‘describe art about the border, art by people living on the border, or simply art located on the border’ (Fox, 1995) of geographic regions such as the U.S./Mexico boundary. Border art is often inevitably reflective of social and political issues prevalent in border regions such as migration (Bal & Hernandez-Navarro, 2011), the identities of communities and individuals (Vélez-Ibáñez, 1996), and relationship to place (Giudice & Giubilaro, 2015). In reflecting on these issues, ‘artists challenge the dominant narratives around [the border], opening up a productive space for resistance and struggle’ (Ibid., p.80), a phenomenon known as cultural resilience (Fleming and Ledogar, 2008). For the people at these geographic borders, ‘National identity, notions of citizenship, democracy, and justice... have been shaped, in part, by the content, form and institutional context of activist art’ (McCaghan qtd. in Sheridan, 2009, p.112) which fills the museums, public spaces, and walls of their regions.
Border art is an important focus of programs at El Paso’s major museum, The El Paso Museum of Art, in ‘recogniz[ing] the region’s diverse cultures’ (El Paso Museum of Art, 2016). At its award-winning biennial art celebrations, work from area artists is presented in collaboration with the Museo de Arte de Ciudad Juárez ‘to connect art, artists and the communities of El Paso and Juárez, despite the continuing violence across the border, and because of it’ (El Paso Inc., 2011). As is customary in creative works of cultural resistance, the themes of the biennial’s artworks vary with the socio-political factors at work at the time: in 2008, the pieces dealt largely with issues of trade, the economy, and capitalism, while two years later there was more emphasis on the topics of migration and the increasingly deadly drug war (Ibid.).
Outside of museums, the sculptures, murals, and other artworks in public places grapple with similar topics that ‘enact small-scale resistances against the status quo’ (Bal & Hernandez-Navarro, 2011, p.9). Mexican mural art is a prevalent example of this art as activism across the Southwest United States. (Sheridan, 2009). The mural movement became a mass ‘means of expression through the communal participation of different voices while simultaneously echoing a single voice’ (Vélez-Ibáñez, 1996, p. 264). Such art depicts the tensions and realities at the intersection of multiple cultures, while simultaneously allowing the communities of each country to ‘retain key elements of structure and identity that preserve its distinctness’ (Fleming & Ledogar, 2008, p.3). In this next section, I will explore two works of public art in the El Paso/Juaréz region that reflect the same fusion of global and regional issues, and thus act as forms of cultural resilience and resistance.
Click on the pictures above for more info
The art and culture in El Paso is largely connected to its multifaceted history, just as much as its location and contemporary challenges. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, El Paso gained its name and function as the pass to the north during the spread of Spanish imperialism and colonialism in the Americas (Vélez-Ibáñez, 1996). In this section, I will take as a basis that imperialism, or ‘the practice, the theory, and the attitudes of a dominating metropolitan centre ruling a distant territory’ and colonialism, or ‘the implanting of settlements on distant territory’ (Said, 1993, p.8) is inextricably linked to culture, as, ‘out of the imperial experiences, notions about culture were clarified, reinforced, criticized, or rejected’ (Ibid., p.9). This idea is reflected throughout the El Paso/Juaréz region in the art and performance produced today, in which the complex history of indigenous people, Spanish settlers, and finally U.S. colonizers is explored and represented.
CULTURAL IMPERIALISM
at the borderlands
CONCLUSION
In El Paso, Texas, a ‘borderlands metropolis whose history is as closely tied to the states of northern Mexico as it is to the states of the southwestern United States’ (Timmons qtd. in Wintz, 1991, p.501), the historic intersection of cultures, countries, and international policies continues to influence its complex cultural landscape. The socio-political factors of its past and present are largely apparent in El Paso’s artistic work, which often contends with and reflects themes of cultural imperialism, cultural resilience, and cosmopolitanism. Through its public art and performances, El Paso’s residents and artists face these factors to construct a distinctive identity within their multicultural society, one that is consistently evolving and affected by the larger forces of the two nations it sits between.
EL PASO, TEXAS, UNITED STATES
CIUDAD JUAREZ, CHIHUAHUA, MEXICO
Population: 1.3 million
Population: 835, 593
Population: 1.3 million
Population estimates as of 2015 (El Paso) and 2010 (Juarez)
(United States Census Bureau, 2016; Mexican National Institute of Geography and Statistics, 2016)
At Scenic Drive Overlook, a lookout point on the side of the Franklin Mountains in El Paso, Texas, the intersection of two distinct countries and cultures is visible. Directly south, a large Mexican flag and looming mountain range mark Ciudad Juaréz, Mexico, a city that in 2008 was ranked the most dangerous in the world (Workman, 2015). The dried-up Rio Grande River divides this from a cluster of tall buildings that make up downtown El Paso, the western-most part of Texas and one of the safest cities in the United States (Ibid.).
A TALE OF
two cities
El Paso’s unique location and cultural landscape is probably best understood by witnessing it in person, yet despite the city’s efforts to attract tourism through the art and culture discussed above, a large number of tourists visit as volunteers. Partly, this trend is influenced by perceptions of life on the border perpetuated by the U.S. media, of problems like ‘drug cartels, illegal immigration... and the spread of Mexican crime and poverty into US cities’ (Campbell, 2005, p.24). While this image may deter the common leisure-seeking tourist, the stereotypes that declare the border as an area in need of help attract another type of person: the cosmopolitan.
COSMOPOLITANISM
and the borderlands
Taking El Paso, Texas as case study, this essay will explore how the cultural and artistic landscape at this part of the U.S./Mexico border has been affected by
socio-political factors such as cultural resilience, cultural imperialism, and cosmopolitanism.
The proximity between El Paso and Juaréz allows larger sculptures or architecture on one side of the border to be easily viewed from the other, and in some cases depict a stark contrast between countries. A poignant example of this is the Mexican artist Sebastián’s ‘La Equis’ or ‘The X’, which stands just south of the border wall in Juaréz. The red sculpture is visible from multiple places across El Paso and along much of its interstate. According to the artist, the sculpture is symbolic of ‘the merging of two cultures in Mexico — the indigenous people and the Spanish,’ (Krausse, 2016) as well as the letter ‘X’ that replaced the ‘J’ in Mexico’s spelling, after former president Benito Juaréz changed it to be more reflective of the region’s indigenous origins (Dougherty, 2013). Yet he’s also agreed that an abundance of meanings can be determined from the sculpture (Integra Comunicación, 2011), such as its red color signifying ‘the blood spilled from the brutal Juarez drug wars’ (Atlas Obscura, 2013).
As noted by one El Paso blogger, ‘At a distance, the border is invisible and it is difficult to distinguish whether the monument stands on the U.S. side or the Mexican side’ (Candelaria, 2013). In this way, it is at once a determiner of place and also reflective of the synthesis of places at the border. To the people of Juaréz, the sculpture stands tall in the face of the opposing American buildings of downtown El Paso and brightly lit star on its Franklin Mountain Range, both symbols of such American ideals as success and freedom. Yet for the residents of El Paso, the visibility of the sculpture can become both a marker of where the U.S. ends and Mexico begins, and a daily reminder of the inevitable relationship between the cities. On the American side, the sculpture may not remind residents of the merging of the indigenous and Spanish cultures in Mexico, but rather the relationship between the American and Mexican cultures of the region. The placement of the sculpture and its theme of hybridization can thus be seen as an example of cultural resistance to the forced division, rather than celebrated integration, of cultures at the U.S./Mexico border.
Mexican-American artist Margarita Cabrera’s work ‘Uplift’, a sculpture in an upscale El Paso neighborhood designed to ‘create conversations about our violent histories here along our border community,’ used the dismantled parts of confiscated guns in a formation of flying birds ‘as a symbol of transcending violence’ (Boucher, 2015). The sculptor enlisted the public in designing the birds’ paper wings, to invoke a communal understanding and reaction to border violence (Ibid.). The resulting work reflects multiple perspectives of the greater communities of El Paso and Juaréz in a public ‘documentation of cultural persistence.... reflect[ing] larger political and cultural processes beyond the locality’ (Vélez-Ibáñez, 1996, p. 264) through its subject of gun violence.
Shortly after its installation though, Cabrera’s sculpture was removed by its commissioner, the City of El Paso, due to a community member’s complaint about the use of gun fragments (Garcia, 2015). To the artist, this reaction ‘clearly exposed a certain stance in the community regarding our history of violence’ (Cabrera qtd. in Garcia, 2015). Even in its deconstruction, the work is representative of how border art is linked to social and political tensions: it can act as a reminder of the challenges of border life that are sometimes too uncomfortable for parts of the public to face, even in the form of steel birds. Commonly in the U.S., ‘Border art is being manipulated to create a favorable image of cultural integration with the United States, a supposed colorful fusion’ (Yepez qtd. in Rapson, 2016a), despite the country’s construction of walls that actually create physical and symbolic divisions across the border landscape (Amilhat Szarhy, 2012). Public artworks of resistance in marginalized communities like Cabrera’s can thus challenge the political aims of government commissioners and members of the public, by depicting communities in ways that differ with the peaceful cohesion they want to believe exists.
‘It is not that the nation-state has no influence on the U.S. Mexican population, but rather that local versions of culture emerge sometimes in resistance to and sometimes in accommodation of the national prism’ (Vélez-Ibáñez, 1996, p.5)
The Equestrian (2006)
‘How do we deal with the crimes of the past when we’re trying to recognize our history?’ asks John Houser, the artist of a much-contested sculpture at the El Paso International Airport (PBS, 2008). His 36-foot bronze statue of Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate was first approved by El Paso’s city council as one of 12 to form a historic trail through the city, but was met with outrage by various El Pasoans and Native Americans (Ibid.). In 1598, Juan de Oñate led an expedition north from Mexico City by order of the Spanish King to spread Roman Catholicism, establishing the first European settlements in the El Paso/Juaréz region (Ibid.). Local myth claims he brought the first Thanksgiving feast to North America shortly after claiming the area for Spain (Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014). The monument would thus be the city’s way of representing this spreading of Spanish/Catholic culture, an act of cultural imperialism, to the region. Yet Oñate is also known for carrying out heinous genocide against the indigenous people of what he called ‘Nuevo Mexico’, most infamously cutting off a foot of every male survivor after an uprising of Acoma Indians (Rodriguez, 2007). The protests against displaying this imperialist and culturally imperialist history slowed the sculpture walk project, envisioned as a tourist attraction, and renounced the Oñate statue of his name. The Oñate sculpture now stands with no reference to the man it is modeled after in a compromise with the activists, but many have criticized that, ‘to deny Oñate's pioneering presence in the Southwest is to deny history’ (Ibid.).
Even if the sculpture is not named, it can’t be denied that its presence at El Paso’s airport is just as much a symbol of a gateway (Ibid.) as it is the cultural imperialism that brought the Spanish/Mestizo culture, and later the American culture to the area. It is impossible to disconnect the idea of imperialism from the work because the statue is a daily reminder of an imperialist force, itself functioning as a form of cultural imperialism in its ‘use of political and economic power to exalt and spread the values and habits of a foreign culture at the expense of a native culture’ (Bullock & Stallybrass qtd. in Rapson, 2016). With the city council’s plan to manipulate these historic moments into tourist attractions:
‘Hispanic history was to be made a selling point for a project that divided both the Mexican American community and the overall urban population over matters of cultural identity, the right to memory and to the telling of history, and the commodification of the past for a tourist market’ (Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014, p.59).
The larger sculpture walk project was consistently ‘framed in a rhetoric of discovery and colonization,’ both imperialist ideals to be displayed through sculpture (Ibid.). In looking to satisfy those who disagreed with the glorification of Oñate, the city generalized the sculpture’s name to attempt a ‘narrative... [that] highlights personal values of courage, determination and bravery rather than the political, economic and social forces behind the conquering process’ (Castillo, 2002, p.14). Yet this could not separate the imperialist themes from the art: It stands majestically in front of El Paso’s airport, the city’s gateway to the rest of the world, simultaneously memorializing the imperialist ideals of the Spanish explorers and the similar American values of ‘manifest destiny’ that eventually claimed the area for the United States. The monument becomes an example of cultural imperialism itself in its commemoration of ‘fundamentally American values, for example the religious motivation of colonization, a tradition of mobility in Oñate’s expedition, or the economic aspirations and achievement of individual colonists’ (Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014, p.63).
‘Four Centuries. Four Cultures. One City’ pronounces the tagline for ‘Viva! El Paso’, a musical production held annually at the McKelligon Canyon amphitheater, at the base of the Franklin Mountains in El Paso (Visit El Paso, 2016). The show chronicles the origins of El Paso, where ‘The Native American, the Spanish Conquistador, the Mexican and the Western American cultures and their histories come alive through drama, song and dance’ (Ibid.). Commissioned in 1978 by the City of El Paso, the production has seen little variation to its main theme since then, which explores El Paso history through the fictional story of a family whose roots go back to before Spanish colonization, quite literally, with the symbol of a tree that grows throughout the play (Del Rosario, 2013). The latest version is framed as a love story: an ‘abuela’ (grandmother) prepares her granddaughter for her wedding by sharing the history of her El Paso family, beginning with her female Native American ancestor’s marriage to a Spanish soldier, then to the blending of the two ethnic groups into the Mexican culture (Lambie, 2015). The show’s final section depicts the expansion of the U.S. railroad into the West, bringing gunfights, saloon girls, and U.S. Army post Fort Bliss to the area (Ibid.).
Viva! El Paso
Presented as a family-friendly tradition (Hettiger, 2015), the consistent aim of the show is to paint a generally historic picture of the various cultural influences on the region and their impact on the city’s culture today. Imperialism is a recurring, if unquestioned, presence throughout the show, due to El Paso’s ‘multilayered past that characterizes the city as a crossroads of multiple exchange routes between south and north, east and west’ (Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014, p.60). In the dances performed are instances of unspoken cultural imperialism, such as the traditional deer dance of the Yaqui tribe performed during the Native American section. Its depiction of nature and spirituality is a reflection of the Jesuit influence on the tribe of Northern Mexico, who brought Catholicism to the natives. As such, this seemingly pure native dance has in actuality been shaped by imperial influence, depicting ‘how oddly hybrid historical and cultural experiences are, of how they partake of many often contradictory experiences and domains, [and] cross national boundaries...’ (Said, 1993, p.15).
Despite some variations over the years, depiction of the destructive realities of Spanish and American colonization is largely avoided to instead suggest a natural fusion of cultures, anchored by the multi-cultural love story throughout. Much like the sculpture of Oñate (who is a character in the Spanish section of the show), the production becomes an example of cultural imperialism in its display of colonization by the Spanish and Americans as natural, progressive, and unquestionably positive. Like with the statue of Oñate:
‘It generates recognizable images which in turn impact on the ways in which the past is perceived and investigated: The disruptive energies of revolutionary and resistance movements were not factored into such consensus-oriented narratives’ (Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014, p.76)
Its projected culture of the border region as a seamless blend is thus Americanized in identity; El Paso becomes a byproduct of a ‘pioneering spirit’ (Ibid.) celebrated and marketed to American tourists as a friendly tale of two nations and their ‘unbroken progression from glorious beginnings to a prosperous future’ (Ibid.). The performance thus functions as an example of cultural imperialism by commodifying the region’s history, and presenting the culture of the border to tourists as a ‘warm and friendly mosaic of cultures, traditions and ethnic groups’ (City of El Paso qtd. in Schwarz-Bierschenk, 2014, p.71) shaped by imperialist forces that still affect it today.
Hover over pictures to expand
In our increasingly globalized society, with technological advances in areas such as transport and media providing greater access to communities across the world, ‘there has been a greater realization that disasters and risks in one country can have global effects’ (Van Hooft, 2014, p.3). As a result of this, the term cosmopolitan has been used to describe someone who sees themself as a ‘global citizen’ with ethical responsibilities that cross cultural boundaries (Ibid., p.1). According to Appiah (2007), the concept of cosmopolitanism has two strands: The first ‘is that we have obligations to others, obligations that stretch beyond those to whom we are related by the ties of kith and kind, or even the more formal ties of a shared citizenship’ (p.xv), and the second ‘is that we take seriously the value not just of human life but of particular human lives, which means taking an interest in the practices and beliefs that lend them significance’ (Ibid.). Both of these strands are visible in El Paso – the first in its appeal to volunteer tourism, and the second in the traditional customs exhibited and practiced regularly in the area, such as folklorico dance.
Border Voluntourism
El Paso’s position at the crossroads of two nations makes it a common site for transnational activism in the form of volunteer trips, as ‘the divisions between people that are created primarily by religion, race, nationality and ethnicity... are of central concern to cosmopolitanism’ (Van Hooft, 2014, p.5). Yet the rising trend of cosmopolitanism and resulting ‘voluntourism’ has been met with much criticism, and claims that programs are ‘designed more for the spiritual fulfillment of the volunteer rather than the alleviation of [issues like] poverty’ in the communities they serve (Mohamud, 2014). A further question is if these programs impact individual and larger changes when participants return home. In the U.S., where racial tensions are seen to be at all time highs (Agiesta, 2015), such programs could be used to educate and create connections between cultures, combatting the negative portrayals of the ‘other’ by the media and foreign policies. Often though, it has been found that many people ‘travel abroad to enjoy the culture of the very people they avoid at home - racializing at home and expressing empathetic interest abroad’ (Priest & Priest, 2008, p.69).
Though volunteer tourism can be criticized as ‘disingenous’ (Mohamud, 2014), El Paso is in a unique place to reverse this by getting ‘volunteers to understand their own (direct or indirect) role’ (Ibid.) in border issues like poverty and immigration. Mexico is in fact the number one location for U.S. mission trips (Priest & Priest, 2008), and many college programs run volunteer trips to El Paso for students to ‘learn about the issues of economic development, food justice, and human rights at the border’ (Emerson College, 2016). The program BorderLinks attempts to raise awareness about immigration issues through educational trips along the Southwest border and in Mexico, where organizers want participants to find solidarity - a cosmopolitan ideal - with Mexicans and Mexican-Americans through speaking with migrants (BorderLinks, 2016). Such trips that involve speaking with El Paso’s people, many of whom are migrants themselves or come from migrant families, can shift the ‘focus [of these programs to] the causes that often stem from an unjust global economic order’ (Mohamud, 2014), creating a more personal understanding of how things like immigration policy affect people.
There is still no guarantee that such programs will truly alter perceptions of the border, but El Paso's unique location at the crossroads of familiar and foreign cultures can ‘help produce a conscience constituency of United States citizens with some increased level of international awareness and personalized sense of connection to international locales’ (Adler, 2012, p.572), if programs focus on educating people honestly about the area. El Paso trips approached in this way can thus merge cosmopolitanism’s ideals of ‘universal concern and respect for legitimate difference’ (Appiah, 2007, p.xv) to at least attempt to combat the influence of media and political agendas in understanding the true reality of border regions.
El Paso’s Traditional Practices: Folklorico
In respecting this ‘legitimate difference’ between cultures, cosmopolitanism emphasizes the importance of understanding the ‘practices and beliefs’ of those cultures (Ibid.). At the border, Mexico’s traditions are evident largely through the art and performance in El Paso, such as the prevalence of folklorico dance. These traditional folk dances of Mexico are staples at most large celebrations in the area, and commonly employed in greeting visiting diplomats or even U.S. sports teams at the airport (Chavez, 2015).
Folklorico’s presence in the U.S. grew largely out of local and state governments in the Southwest ‘being concerned with developing a relationship with Mexico by understanding the customs of the neighbors across the border’ (Hellier-Tinoco, 2011, p.111), and eventually influenced the perception of Mexican culture and identity across the country. For Mexican-Americans and non-Mexicans alike in border regions like El Paso, the study and performance of folklorico can offer a sense of shared identity and connection to the community or their own heritage, yet the dances can also shape a ‘collective gaze’ of Mexican culture based off the few most popular dances to make their way across the border (Ibid.).
This over-generalization of culture, a common critique of cosmopolitanism (Van Hooft, 2014, p.26), has led to:
‘...an epistemological framing in which the restricted set of dances, music, and ritual practices are regarded as representative of a whole way of life, and that by knowing and viewing these practices, onlookers have knowledge of the real lives of these people as exotic others’ (Ibid., p.245)
Folklorico thus functions as a way of connecting people despite cultural differences, a main theme of cosmopolitanism, but has also created expectations of Mexican culture that do not represent the true depth of the country and its history. In performing these dances across the border in El Paso, folklorico ‘plays a role in the formation of a sense of community identity and cohesion... to shape and construct their own identities, histories, and memories’ (Ibid., p.259), but can also lack the comprehensive experience of Mexican culture that will lead to cosmopolitan ideals of solidarity and kinship (Van Hooft, 2014). Viewing or participating in folklorico should thus be emphasized as a gateway to communicating with and understanding the border culture, a way of teaching ‘cultural awareness and accepting those that are different’ through dance (Johnson qt. in Toussaint, 2015). The art form can facilitate dialogue and connection between the outsider and the local, or between non-Mexican and Mexican residents, but the complex culture at the border ‘continues to be constructed and shaped by all who participate in these performances, as creators, visitors, viewers... and enactors’ (Hellier-Tinoco, 2011, p.259).
