Labyrinth Of Solitude Summary

This section of the Labyrinth of Solitude was really interesting and made me aware of a different lens in order to view Mexicans. For instance, in the first chapter Paz talks about how the Pachucos don’t identify with either Mexicans or people born in the United States. They have their own identity and they make it obvious through their clothing. From what I have learned before, I always had this perspective of Pachucos being violent rebels of society. Paz makes an assumption that the Pachucos are antisocial because they are facing an identity crisis. They don’t want to partake in any culture and that’s why they have such hostile attitudes because they want to be different. Additionally, this demonstrates the idea of how different the Mexican culture is from the U.S. culture. Each culture has different aspects associated with itself that are so different that it is extremely difficult to live in communion. Also, the Mexican is similar to the Pachuco because he doesn’t want to be an Indian, Spaniard or just a mixture of both instead they want their own identity. I found that this was highly evident back in Mexico because none of my relatives would talk about Mexicans having
When we are infancy we tend to accept the world how it is and is not until we reach adolescence is when we begin to questions the things that we have always been told. I agree with Paz that a lot of our history that is pass down is lost because of this “mask” people tend to hide in. Consequently, a lot of our history is loss due to the fact that people tend to hide their shame and emotions in order to not be judge publicly. So when we are learning about the past we should always see it through an open mind knowing the fact that the stories that are being told are not always what they appear to be because of all the tragedy going on during