Mexican Folk Music: El Corrido Essay -- Music, Oral Folk History

During the late 19th century and early 20th century, a form of Mexican kinsperson music called the corrido gained popularity along the Mexico-Texan brink (Saldvar). growth from the Spanish romance tradition, the corrido is a fudge ballad that arose chronicling the history of border conflicts and its effects on Mexican-Mexican culture (Saldvar). A sort of oral folk history, the corrido was studied intensely by Amrico Paredes, who then constructed his masterpiece, George upper-case letter Gomez, around the context and writing of the corrido (Mendoza 146). But the falsehood is not a traditional corrido, in which the legendary hero take holds his mass and dies for his honor. Instead, through its plot, characterization, and rhetorical devices, George Washington Gomez is an anti-corrido.The corrido has been identified as having typical characteristics that make up its theme and plot. First, the corrido has a context of hostile relations between Anglos and Mexicans along the borde r and the establishment of a scenic structure, geographical locale, and opposing social forces (Mendoza 146). The corridos hero is a hard-working, peace-loving Mexican, who, when goaded by Anglos, outrages into violence, causing him to defend his rights and those of others of his community against the rinches, the Rangers (Saldvar). This hero is quickly introduced in legendary proportions and defiant top and many people essential die before the hero reaches his triumphant, scarcely tragic, demise (Mendoza 146). The Anglos in the corrido, meanwhile, are not one-dimensional villains but hard figures who contain positive as well as negative qualities (Mendoza 146). These distinctive traits of a corrido setting, conflict, and characterization, among others ... ...l. Ge-or-ge, she called in an exaggerated Gringo accent. He looked back. Tears were running blast her rigid, expressionless face. Cabron she said. Vendido sanavabiche (Paredes 294) In this way, George no longer Gunlito has politically and culturally betrayed his people, and is not is not the tragic hero who has died in defense of his people (Mendoza 148). In conclusion, through its plot, characterization, and rhetorical devices such as tone, George Washington Gomez is an anti-corrido. However, it must be said that perhaps in its purpose as an anti-corrido, the novel is a corrido. In telling the story of Gunlito, the anti-hero of the Mexicotexans, perhaps Paredes is apprisal the readers his own border ballad, an ironic, cautionary tale to the Chicanos to remember who they are and where they came from and to resist, always, as a corrido hero would.