John Sullivan Glenbrook South High School

As a social studies teacher, I have taken some pride in my knowledge of events and trends in world and United States history. However, after reading F. Arturo Rosales' book, CHICANO!, that bit of historical hubris has been removed. If nothing else, this reading has proven a powerful reminder of how little I and perhaps other history teachers know about issues not covered in mainstream textbooks. Like Howard Zinn's A People's History of The United States, Rosales's book illustrates how History, with a capital "H" often ignores the stories of the disenfranchised which might muddy the mainstream and accepted memory of a nation. Having been born in 1962, my own memory of the 1960s and 1970s is colored by the antiwar protests and Black civil rights movement. These were the events which garnered the media's attention and as a result became ingrained in the national memory. Other events like the Mexican-American civil rights movement, received only brief national attention and have not been given the same historical significance as the more widely covered events of the same time period. With our nation's rapidly changing demographics, the re-examination of the Mexican American civil rights movement is not only overdue but of some urgency. F. Arturo Rosales' work has provided me with a new awareness of the historical roots of Mexican-Americans and an understanding of issues facing our nation today.

After reading and reflecting on the content of CHICANO!, I identified three themes that have a broader historical application. One of the requirements of teaching history in high school is taking specific historical events and helping students identify the universal themes that can be applied more globally. The relationship between a conquering power and conquered peoples is vividly described in the first chapter of CHICANO!. Rosales explains how the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 guaranteed the rights of citizenship to the inhabitants of the territory that had once been Mexico. The failure of the United States government to insure that these rights were protected provides an example that can be compared and contrasted to similar situations in the past and present. Is the Israeli government's treatment of Palestinians living within its borders a similar situation? What about the Israeli treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories? British treatment of Irish Catholics could also be examined using the theme presented by Rosales.

Another theme found in CHICANO! is nation building. As the United States fulfilled its "manifest destiny" it sought to create a nation. Rosales views the creation of an "American" national identity as the simultaneous elimination of the Spanish-Mexican identity. How is a national identity created? Analysis of other attempts to create a nation would increase student understanding of our own national experience. Examination of Aztec history might be helpful considering its connection to the Mexican-American identity. Rosales, himself, points out the early Mexican treatment of indigenous people in what is now the American southwest. In truth, Rosales's work seems to stress the over?riding importance of a sense of identity. The adoption of a mythology was a cornerstone of the Chicano movement in the 1960s.

A final theme in CHICANO! is the concept of assimilation itself. Rosales does not seem able to bring himself to the conclusion that an identity within the greater American experience is what many Mexican-Americans desire today. Is assimilation really a dirty word? Richard Rodriquez in Hunger of Mentor, provides a provocative argument in favor of assimilation. Can a "movement" survive without the active involvement of the mass of people it is trying to move? Was the Chicano movement really the creation of a minority of Mexican-Americans without the recognition or participation of the greater bulk of Mexican-Americans? Perhaps today we are seeing that most Americans of Mexican descent see themselves as American first and as Mexican second. If this is the case, has the idea of a Chicano movement become passé? The struggle for equality and civil rights should be universal and not subject to the divisiveness that often results from group identification. The lessons of the late 1960s should be recognized. Rosales identification and study of a group is historically expedient but may ignore the reality that assimilation is an individual decision and act. Individuals acting in their own self-interest will most frequently choose the path offering the greatest opportunity.

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