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Article published In:
Art and the expression of complex identities: Imagining and contesting ethnicity in performance
Edited by Valentina Pagliai and Marcia Farr
[Pragmatics 10:1] 2000
► pp. 99–123

Sol, sombra, y media luz

History, parody, and identity formation in the Mexican American carpa

This paper analyzes a parody of the tango “A media luz” that was performed by Rodolfo Garcia, a Mexican American comedian who worked in his family’s tent show, the Carpa Garcia, in the early 1940s. I argue that by juxtaposing the generic conventions of the tango with those of the canción ranchera and by introducing carnivalesque humor, Mr. Garcia’s parody articulated a distinctly local Mexican American identity which was strongly linked to a sense of working-class masculinity. In this way, the parody highlights the class- and gender-based contradictions that were inherent in ongoing processes of Mexican American identity fonnation at mid-century.

Keywords: popular theater, genre, greater Mexico
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.
Published online: 1 March 2000
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.10.1.06han
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