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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (May 4, 2004)
Americans misunderstand Cinco de Mayo history Most Americans are under the mistaken impression that Cinco de Mayo is a Mexican independence day By Eun-Kyung Kim St. Louis Post-Dispatch (KRT) ST. LOUIS — It's a holiday often mistakenly celebrated as the Mexican Fourth of July, to the surprise of many Mexican natives. "Cinco de Mayo has nothing to do with Mexican independence from Spain, far from it," said Guillermo Rosas, a Mexico City native "If you were to rank the most important celebra tions in Mexico, this would probably come a distant third or fourth ." I----— The holiday has come to evoke images of exotic dancers rhythmical ly stamping to mariachi bands, as well as loaded plates of spicy food and pitchers of margaritas and cerveza. While many Hispanics em brace the holiday as a cultural cele bration, just as many lament its esca lation into a promotional gimmick. Cinco de Mayo, or the fifth of May, commemorates an 1862 battle in Puebla, Mexico, in which a small troop of Mexican soldiers defeated a much larger French force. France ulti mately displaced the Mexicans, but its rule over Mexico was short-lived. "Across the border, it simply is not celebrated very much," said Jose Limon, director of the Center for Mex ican American Studies at the University ofTexas at Austin. Rosas said he remembers getting die holiday off from school as a child. Politicians also liked to deliver speeches at the Puebla batde site. But that stopped more than two decades ago, and when Rosas came to the United States in 1995 to attend a doctoral de gree program at Duke University, he was amazed by how Americans cele brated Cinco de Mayo with such gusto. "I was very surprised that Americans of all backgrounds knew about the cel ebrations. I would have assumed that Sept. 16, which is the main holiday in Mexico, would be somehow best known, much as Mexicans know that the Americans celebrate the Fourth of July as their main national holiday," said Rosas, who teaches Latin American politics at Washington University. He also was surprised that nearly everyone he met believed that Cinco de Mayo was a celebration of Mexico's independence from Spain. Limon pointed out that even some Hispanics of Mexican descent aren't aware of the history behind the holiday. "A lot of people use the occasion to celebrate their heritage in some very generalized way," he said. "But even as people are celebrating and going to var ious festivities, they have no idea what the/re celebrating, except that some how it has to do with Mexican-Ameri cans and Mexico and it has the Spanish words, 'Cinco de Mayo' attached to it." There are about 24 million U.S. resi dents with Mexican ancestry, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — about 9 percent of all U.S. residents. Eileen Wolfington said the holiday had never been a big deal to her — or her Mexican mother, who immigrat ed to the United States in her 20s. "I didn't even know what it was when I was growing up," she said. "My mom never said, 'Oh, it's Cinco de Mayo, let's go out.'" It wasn't until Wolfington got old er that she learned about the holiday. "And then 1 thought to myself, an other way for the for-profit world to commercialize an event that people don't even know what the heck they're celebrating," she said. (c) 2004, St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services. .. wr _ ' fplll# ■ ■S ■ ’ ■ • ^ s- ... •■ „ -V. .s V ‘i . ' v'\i% < ^ ' '■ s' , Si; ....... ............... Lilu, a Chihuahua, frolics near the library as her owners, journalism graduate student Molly Wushu Club member David Ng, a pre-journalism major, does a flying kick in the EMU Amphitheater on Monday. Eight other Hendrickson and senior finance major Levi McClain, enjoy the sun Monday afternoon. members of the UO Club Sports group participated in the performance. Enhance your education with the Professional Distinctions program Compliment your liberal arts degree with a specific set of professional perspectives and skills. For full information go to https://uodistinctions.uoregon.edu or visit the UO Career Center, 220 Hendricks Hall. 541.346.3166
