Tag Archives: altar

Dia De Los Muertos-Day of the Dead: Mexican Holiday

Text: 

Me: “Do you have any holidays, rituals, or beliefs that you would like to share?”

DR: “Yes, I can talk about Dia de los Muertos.”

Me: “Is it a traditional holiday within your culture?”

DR: “Yes it’s a Mexican holiday typically celebrated Nov 1st-Nov 2nd every year. November 1st is dedicated to children who have died while November 2nd is the day celebrated for all other deceased people. The tradition usually happens at the cemetery or at one’s home. In the home, an altar is set up for the deceased people or individuals. They have decorations such as papel picado (colorful paper), cempasuchil which is a type of flower, and food that the deceased once loved. There are usually religious figures around the altar, most famously La Virgen de Guadalupe and other holy saints. These two days are meant to celebrate the life of the ones who have passed on and to allow them to come back in spirit while joining us in the real-world. It is often normal to see people painting their face to look like skeletons; this is to create a unity and to blur the line between the dead and the living.” 

Context (informant’s relationship to the piece, where they heard it, how they interpret it):

-DR’s relationship to this traditional Mexican holiday stems from her Mexican and Salvadorian culture as it’s an important holiday that is celebrated within her home. Her relationship to this traditional holiday also stems from the connection that she shares with her family as they honor their loved ones that have passed. For example, DR’s mother’s grandfather is always recognized and celebrated as her mom’s side of the family always goes to the cemetery, decorates his grave, and has a picnic with the foods that he loved. DR would hear about this holiday all through her life as she grew up in a typical Mexican household. DR has always been exposed to Dia de los Muertos as her own family traditionally celebrates it but she has also been exposed to it by attending a predominantly Latino grade school where the holiday was always honored and evident; an altar was typically displayed in her school’s library. DR interprets this holiday as a beautiful tradition that shouldn’t be looked upon with a somber attitude. Instead, DR interprets this festive practice as a happy way to remember our loved ones in a celebratory manner.

Analysis(what kind of personal, cultural, or historical values might be expressed) YOUR interpretation:

-The overall cultural value within Dia de los Muertos stems from a typical Mexican culture considering this holiday has originated and is widely evident in various parts of Mexico following the Mexican heritage. The cultural value of community is evident within this holiday considering Mexican communities come together to celebrate and to pay their respects. The personal values that are expressed within this celebratory holiday follows the religious and spiritual beliefs of many Catholic individuals. Given that Catholicism is typical for Mexican families to condone in, it is evident that the emphasis of celebrating one’s spirit during Dia de los Muertos is related to their idolization of religious figures (La Virgen de Guadalupe/Mother Mary) since many Catholics believe that the spirits of those who have passed on can still be present in the real-world. I interpret this holiday as an ethereal practice of remembrance, community, and love. Given the fact that I have not accurately celebrated this holiday despite my Mexican culture, I can appreciate the concept of acknowledging one’s passing instead of mourning them with a sad and downhearted connotation. Overall, I can see this holiday as a joyful practice where one’s spirituality is met, pronounced, and proven, given that many religious individuals feel deeply that the spirits of the deceased have the power to rejoin others in unity. Dia de los Muertos follows the ideology of being a cyclic holiday considering the cycle of one’s life, time, and season is evident and celebrated. Not to mention, the idea of post-productive life can be seen as the main emphasis of this holiday considering death is targeted as the means for festivity. A traditional practice that differs from the celebratory event of Dia de los Muertos is modernized funerals. Within American society, funerals are seen as disheartening events that are used to mourn those who have passed. Black clothes, tears, and white flowers within a traditional funeral are elements that can be contradicting to the colorful decorations, bright orange cempasuchil flowers, and the light-hearted picnics that take place during November 1-2.

Vietnamese “Day of the Dead”

Context:

My informant is a 20 year old student at the University of Southern California (USC). This conversation took place one night at Cafe 84, a place where many students at USC go to study at night. The informant and I sat alone at our own table, but were in an open space where there was a lot of background noise. In this account, he talks about a Vietnamese tradition, similar to the Day of the Dead, that his family practices every year in order to honor and respect his family’s ancestors. My informant says he never officially learned this folklore, but rather that his mom “just started doing it… One day I woke up and there’s just this altar in the middle of my house.” This is a transcription of his folklore, where he is identified as N and I am identified as K.

 

Text:

N: Hello, so um, this is really similar to the Spanish Day of the Dead—I don’t really know what it’s called to be honest—but it’s kind of like an ancestral worship thing, so like…

 

K: But specific only to Vietnamese?

 

N: Yeah for Vietnamese people! So we have a bunch of pictures of our ancestors, and then we have a bunch of food that we put on the table… Honestly we didn’t do much more than that. I’m pretty there’s a whole other tradition that went along with it…

 

K: Okay but why did you do it?

 

N: Just to like worship your ancestors and stuff. Like, “pay respect to your ancestors” kind of thing, and we’d just have pictures of a bunch on them on our table and we’d like offer them, like, Vietnamese food offerings.

 

K: Were they supposed to, like, come back and visit you or something?

 

N: No… well, maybe, I don’t know! Yeah… so that’s it.

 

Thoughts:

In this account, it was clear that my informant didn’t know a lot about the tradition and was even slightly unenthusiastic about it. This may be attributed to the fact that he’s uncomfortable because he feels that he should know more about the tradition because his family has been doing it every year ever since he can remember. During our conversation, it seemed like he felt a little ashamed or guilty that he wasn’t as informed, especially when he knows it’s so important to his family.

In a separate conversation, my informant told me that his parents were immigrants to this country, but that he was born in Los Angeles, California. Sometimes, people can be embarrassed or shy when they tell cultural stories, especially if they don’t have strong connections to their culture, which seems to be the case with my informant. Even though he gets the gist of it, my informant seems disconnected from this practice because he was never the one to set up the altar, pull out the photos of his ancestors, or cook the food that his family offered. In this case, my informant seems to only be a passive bearer of this tradition: he can recognize the folklore when it’s performed or being created, but he doesn’t seem capable of replicating it. His parents, on the other hand, have clearly been the active bearers of this tradition in his family. This could be due to the fact that they are immigrants, and thus are much more strongly connected to its purpose.

This tradition speaks to immigrant status and identity; my informant is in a liminal state of being a part of a Vietnamese identity because he was born to Vietnamese parents, but also being American because of the fact that he was born and raised in America. Because of this, he loses a lot of the authenticity of his Vietnamese identity. Even from the very start, we can see that he introduces this tradition not by it’s Vietnamese name, but as a tradition that is “similar to the Spanish Day of the Dead.” Perhaps this is because in America, Day of the Dead is much more well-known and integrated into American culture than most other ethnic holidays. For example, when I took Spanish in high school, we would celebrate Day of the Dead every year as a way to immerse ourselves into the culture. As a child, it’s possible that he came to understand his own family’s folklore in the context of America. Thus, rather than thinking that Day of the Dead is similar to this Vietnamese tradition that his family practices, his mind was instead wired to notice that this tradition is similar to the popular holiday of Day of the Dead.

On the other hand, understanding that Day of the Dead is a much more understood and well-known celebration, my informant perhaps uses Day of the Dead to explain his tradition in terms of other peoples folklore to help it be better understood. His way of introducing it as a Vietnamese version of the Day of the Dead could be his way of saying “Day of the Dead is not a mainstream holiday, and neither is mine.”