The art and history of the Aztecs was given special attention as the aztecas were considered the true symbols of the ancient indigenous nation that became modern Mexico, while the history of figures like Miguel Hidalgo, the priest who declared war against the Spanish crown’s colonization of Mexican territory, was reworked and incorporated into a nationalist discourse that celebrated Mexican indigeneity and independence. Of course, Diaz’s promotion of a national identity with its attendant festivals, monuments, paintings, and avenues was also a way to consolidate the modern state as a “hegemonic form of political organization…and the predominant source of collective identity” with Diaz firmly at the head. Indigenous voices calling for greater autonomy from the state were ignored or repressed, while caudillos and rurales maintained a firm grip on peasant communities located far from the capital. It is interesting, then, that this corrido features a broad invocation of the Mexican nation followed by a pivot to the pueblo as both the literal and figurative locus of the audience and its
The art and history of the Aztecs was given special attention as the aztecas were considered the true symbols of the ancient indigenous nation that became modern Mexico, while the history of figures like Miguel Hidalgo, the priest who declared war against the Spanish crown’s colonization of Mexican territory, was reworked and incorporated into a nationalist discourse that celebrated Mexican indigeneity and independence. Of course, Diaz’s promotion of a national identity with its attendant festivals, monuments, paintings, and avenues was also a way to consolidate the modern state as a “hegemonic form of political organization…and the predominant source of collective identity” with Diaz firmly at the head. Indigenous voices calling for greater autonomy from the state were ignored or repressed, while caudillos and rurales maintained a firm grip on peasant communities located far from the capital. It is interesting, then, that this corrido features a broad invocation of the Mexican nation followed by a pivot to the pueblo as both the literal and figurative locus of the audience and its