Another week, another load of work, unfortunately only got to read the mestizaje article by Peter Wade which was very interesting. Firstly, what took my interest was by how malleable the term ‘mestizaje’ is; on p240 he tells us how scholars acknowledge that ‘mestizaje’ does not have a single meaning within the Latin American context, and can have meanings of sameness and difference. This strikes me, as it appears that this is one of many terms which are extremely malleable and open to interpretation in this course. Naturally this creates a great amount of discussion surrounding the term – which makes up a significant part of this piece.

Due to the all inclusiveness of the term, the mestizo is seen to be someone who can incorporate or even inherit elements of other cultures alien to their cultural origins (discussed on p249). However, Wade is quick to point out that elements of original race aren’t disbanded in mestizoness – they are meant to be represented in the fusion of the mestizo (p245).

It was interesting to notice that more specifically in Columbia, the idea that the body is shaped by biological and cultural process is related to origins with racial associations …the example of Penaloza (composer) who witnessed an argument between band director/player – essentially said that to play the style of the region you had to consume the food of the region and be part of it as a whole. A further example of this is on p248 – where sambrosa/sexual fission is associated with blackness in dancing. This slightly ties in to what he is saying on p243 – where he argues that the idea of ‘mestizoness’ needs black people (often referred to as ‘los negros’) in order to exist – is this similar to how Peronism paradoxically needed the wealthy elite to exist?

Conversely, Stutzman ‘famously defined mestizaje as an ‘ all-inclusive ideology of exclusion’, a system of ideas that appeared to include everyone as a potential mestizo, but actually excluded black and indigenous people’ (p241). Quite different to what follows on p243: ‘the very idea of mixture depends fundamentally on the idea not only of whiteness, but also of blackness and indigenousness.’

What interested me most was the notion of how mestizaje can be enhanced through popular music which can simultaneously encourage diversity. This fundamentally shows how powerful music is (which becomes increasingly apparent through discussion later into the article), and how much of a cornerstone music continues to be for ‘mestizaje’ – music is very fluid, as it is often considered a language without words which everyone can understand.