Menchú

• Menchú, Rigoberta. I, Rigoberta Menchú: An Indian Woman in Guatemala. Ed. Elisabeth Burgos-Debray. Trans. Ann Wright. London: Verso, 1984.
  • This book is longer than most of those we are reading. Ideally, I would like you to read all of it, but if you want you may skip chapters 8-13 (pages 43-91), which deal in general terms with indigenous traditions in the highlands. But do be sure to read Burgos-Debray's introduction, which is important.

On Rigoberta Menchú

A conversation about I, Rigoberta Menchú, with John Beverley (University of Pittsburgh)

Menchú videos

Rigoberta Menchú: Indigenous Rights in Guatemala (Documentary, 1992, VHS):

One Billion Acts of Peace | Rigoberta Menchu | Talks at Google:

Rigoberta Menchu: Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples:

Rigoberta Menchu Address:

• Asturias, Miguel Ángel. Men of Maize. Trans. Gerald Martin. London: Verso, 1988.
• Barnet, Miguel. Biography of a Runaway Slave. Trans. Nick Hill. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone, 1994.
• Beverley, John. Against Literature. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993.
• Brittin, Alice. “Close Encounters of the Third World Kind: Rigoberta Menchú and Elisabeth Burgos’s Me llamo Rigoberta Menchú.” Latin American Perspectives 22.4 (Autumn 1995): 100-114.
• Burgos, Elisabeth. “The Story of a Testimonio.” Trans. Robert Austin. Latin American Perspectives 26.6 (November 1999): 53-63.
• Corsín Jiménez, Alberto, and Chloe Nahum-Claudel. “The Anthropology of Traps: Concrete Technologies and Theoretical Interfaces.” Journal of Material Culture 24.4 (2019): 383-400.
• Damrosch, David. What is World Literature? Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003.
• Gugelberger, Georg, ed. The Real Thing: Testimonial Discourse and Latin America. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996.
• Menchú, Rigoberta. Crossing Borders. Trans. and ed. Ann Wright. London: Verso, 1998.
• Montejo, Esteban. The Autobiography of a Runaway Slave. Trans. Jocasta Innes. Warwick University Caribbean Studies. London: Macmillan, 1993.
• Nelson, Diane. “Indian Giver or Nobel Savage: Duping, Assumptions of Identity, and Other Double Entendres in Rigoberta Menchú Tum’s Stoll/en Past.” American Ethnologist 28.2 (May 2001): 303-331.
• Pratt, Mary Louise. Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation. London: Routledge, 1992.
• -----. “I, Rigoberta Menchú and the ‘Culture Wars.’” The Rigoberta Menchú Controversy. Ed. Arturo Arias. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001. 29-48.
• Rohter, Larry. “Tarnished Laureate.” The Rigoberta Menchú Controversy. Ed. Arturo Arias. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001. 58-65.
• Saint Augustine. Confessions. Trans. R. S. Pine-Coffin. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1961.
• Shaw, Donald. “Towards a Description of the Post-Boom.” Bulletin of Hispanic Studies 66.1 (January 1989): 87-94.
• Sommer, Doris. “Rigoberta’s Secrets.” Latin American Perspectives 18.3, Voices of the Voiceless in Testimonial Literature, Part I (Summer 1991): 32-50.
• Stoll, David. Rigoberta Menchú and the Story of All Poor Guatemalans. Expanded Ed. New York: Routledge, 2018.
• “The Nobel Peace Prize 1992”. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2023.
• Walsh, Rodolfo. Operation Massacre. Trans Daniella Gitlin. New York: Seven Stories, 2013.

Rigoberta Menchú describes how, like many other inhabitants of Guatemala’s northern highlands, she and her family spend much of the year as migrant labourers on large farms or “fincas” on the country’s southern coast, harvesting (in harsh conditions and for minimal pay) cotton or coffee. Both products, however, are grown primarily for export. As she explains, “we’re not used to drinking coffee. Our drink is atol, ground maize made into atol” (140). Atol is thus one of the very many uses to which people throughout Central America and much of southern Mexico (where it is called atole) put maize (or corn). Above all, maize is food, nourishment, prepared in a wide variety of forms, from the hand-made tortillas that are a staple at every meal (or which, with a pinch of salt, pass for a meal in themselves) to the tamales that Menchú mentions particularly in connection with special occasions; the husks are also fed to domesticated animals, such as dogs and pigs. More generally, as Menchú puts it: “Maize is the centre of everything for us. It is our culture” (54); a child born into the community is “already made of maize because his mother ate it while he was forming in her stomach” (13). To echo the title of Guatemalan writer Miguel Ángel Asturias’s 1949 novel (drawing in turn on the Mayan sacred text, the Popol Vuh), these are Hombres de maíz: people of maize.

Menchú questions

The following questions are taken from your blog posts…

On Secrets

Do you think more content from Rigoberta’s cultural identity/traditions would have helped this mission? Or does its exclusion help clarify the deeper message of her stories.

Did the idea of secrets and lies affect the story’s ability to resonate with you? Did it cause you to get wrapped up in the guessing game of secrets?

What do you think the significance of her choosing to tell us that she has chosen to keep this secret is?

On Truth and Errors

How did knowing this detail (errors in the story) affect your reading and take away?

If some events are lies, does that change your whole perspective on content? Would you consider the author a liar, or would you still have a strong attachment to her?

How “credible” did you think Menchú’s book is, in terms of objective credibility? Not in terms of historical accuracy, per se, but more on how credible the book felt to ‘you’. Were there any parts of the book that seemed to indicate bias? Should we even care about objective credibility when engaging in biographical works such as this?

Does the revelation that some of the stories in the book were fabricated leave you feeling “betrayed” or does it make the reading experience more captivating? How do the distortions and exaggerations of events impact your reading experience?

After hearing about the contradiction between Rigoberta’s account and the people who looked into the background of Rigoberta, how has the feelings towards her story changed for you? Do you believe her, and what is you take away from the novel now that this has come to light?

How much do you think matters that all the details are true, given the genre of the book? Do you think it should be disclosed if some parts are stretched from the truth? Would that undermine the whole narrative?

On Religion

What did you think about Menchú’s relationship with religion? Did it surprise you? How do you think this impacted her outlook and struggles throughout her life experiences dictated in the novel?

How does one separate Christian doctrine from the heinous colonial acts done in the name of Christianity? Is this possible? Why or why not?

What do you make of the questioning of her faiths at the end of the book?

On Indigeneity

Do you know of any other Indigenous communities that have been or are facing discrimination similar to what Menchú describes in the book?

What did you think of the mentality that Menchú’s Kiché community has, in always being prepared for death, are there any other situations that this mentality can be applied to, such as in stressful events?

Do you think the oral tradition is respected or maintained by the book? Why? Why not?

On Struggle and Resistance

Do you think that if members of her family hadn’t died she wouldn’t have become as big of an activist like this?

Do you think the community’s culture, hard work ethic, and the oppression they faced started Menchú’s path to becoming a leader and activist? What are some examples of oppression, events or characters you thought of that shaped Menchú into taking on a leadership role?

What aspects about Rigoberta’s way of “fighting” back were the most interesting to you? And also, do you find it important for not only university students in a Latin American literature class but also students in general to read this book?

How do you think Rigoberta Menchú was able to push through the grief she experienced in her life and continue to be an activist?

If you’ve every experienced an injustice, how could you turn it into a greater cause without writing about it?

What kind of power / how much power does the act of personal storytelling hold?

On Language

Disconnect between languages is a recurring problem in this book. What does using Spanish as a lingua franca symbolize as a result? Why is Menchú reluctant to learn Spanish?

In what ways does the language of the autobiography articulate, but also hold captive, the stories authors try to tell?

On the Curriculum

What do you think the importance is of having read ‘testimonios’ or first-hand accounts of indigenous peoples’ experiences? Do you think more books like this one should be implemented into the school curriculum? Why or why not?

Even though the truth of the novel has been brought into question, do you think that the novel should be mandatory reading, like what Stanford did?

On Impact

Was there one element of Rigoberta’s testimony that most emotionally struck you? Were you surprised by her ‘positive’ approach of such heavy topics?

What part of the text was the most shocking/eye-opening for you?

How did the book make you think about the world we live in, and the privilege we have in society? Did it make you reflect on your own positionally?

Do others feel that this book changed their mind on any major points, or did it just reinforce or augment existing beliefs?

Do you think this book and Rigoberta’s life story contributed to raise awareness about the indigenous rights movement in Guatemala at an international level? How?

In what ways do you think this book may have contributed to discourse on human rights? How does Menchu portray memory throughout her testimonio?

On the Introduction

Did you think that reading the introduction affected the way you read the rest of the book (i.e. Rigoberta’s voice)?

Do you think Rigoberta Menchú and Elisabeth Burgos-Debray were as close as the introduction would lead us to believe?

Other

What did you think of what Rigoberta and her mother have to say about machismo?

Which family member’s death do you think had the most impact on the story and Rigoberta?

Some blog posts mention Mama Blanca’s Memoirs when trying to digest this week’s blog post. Are there similarities and/or differences that you noticed, and is there one you prefer over theother?

Is it essential for cultures to blend and come together? How can this be done in a way that still preserves traditional values and beliefs?

What was your favorite quote from the book and why?

Was this your first time reading a testimonio from this time period/region? If not, how did I, Rigoberta Menchu, compare to what you have read in the past?

What was the biggest conflict you felt Menchu overcame to progress the influence of her voice?

What do you think the significance of that ending paragraph is?

Do you think Menchú was in the wrong when she told her “own” stories of the indigenous communities facing oppression and being silenced?