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A Xicana Codex of Changing Consciousness: Writings, 2000-2010
A Xicana Codex of Changing Consciousness features essays and poems by Cherríe L. Moraga, one of the most influential figures in Chicana/o, feminist, queer, and indigenous activism and scholarship. Combining moving personal stories with trenchant political and cultural critique, the writer, activist, teacher, dramatist, mother, daughter, comadre, and lesbian lover looks back on the first ten years of the twenty-first century.
Moraga considers decade-defining public events such as 9/11 and the campaign and election of Barack Obama, and she explores socioeconomic, cultural, and political phenomena closer to home, sharing her fears about raising her son amid increasing urban violence and the many forms of dehumanization faced by young men of color. Moraga describes her deepening grief as she loses her mother to Alzheimer’s; pays poignant tribute to friends who passed away, including the sculptor Marsha Gómez and the poets Alfred Arteaga, Pat Parker, and Audre Lorde; and offers a heartfelt essay about her personal and political relationship with Gloria Anzaldúa.
Thirty years after the publication of Anzaldúa and Moraga’s collection This Bridge Called My Back, a landmark of women-of-color feminism, Moraga’s literary and political praxis remains motivated by and intertwined with indigenous spirituality and her identity as Chicana lesbian. Yet aspects of her thinking have changed over time. A Xicana Codex of Changing Consciousness reveals key transformations in Moraga’s thought; the breadth, rigor, and philosophical depth of her work; her views on contemporary debates about citizenship, immigration, and gay marriage; and her deepening involvement in transnational feminist and indigenous activism. It is a major statement from one of our most important public intellectuals.
Moraga considers decade-defining public events such as 9/11 and the campaign and election of Barack Obama, and she explores socioeconomic, cultural, and political phenomena closer to home, sharing her fears about raising her son amid increasing urban violence and the many forms of dehumanization faced by young men of color. Moraga describes her deepening grief as she loses her mother to Alzheimer’s; pays poignant tribute to friends who passed away, including the sculptor Marsha Gómez and the poets Alfred Arteaga, Pat Parker, and Audre Lorde; and offers a heartfelt essay about her personal and political relationship with Gloria Anzaldúa.
Thirty years after the publication of Anzaldúa and Moraga’s collection This Bridge Called My Back, a landmark of women-of-color feminism, Moraga’s literary and political praxis remains motivated by and intertwined with indigenous spirituality and her identity as Chicana lesbian. Yet aspects of her thinking have changed over time. A Xicana Codex of Changing Consciousness reveals key transformations in Moraga’s thought; the breadth, rigor, and philosophical depth of her work; her views on contemporary debates about citizenship, immigration, and gay marriage; and her deepening involvement in transnational feminist and indigenous activism. It is a major statement from one of our most important public intellectuals.
280 pages, Paperback
First published May 17, 2011
13 people are currently reading
656 people want to read
About the author
Cherríe L. Moraga
32 books362 followersCherríe Lawrence Moraga is a Chicana writer, feminist activist, poet, essayist, and playwright. She is part of the faculty at Stanford University in the Department of Drama and Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. Her works explore the ways in which gender, sexuality and race intersect in the lives of women of color.
Moraga was one of the few writers to write and introduce the theory on Chicana lesbianism. Her interests include the intersections of gender, sexuality, and race, particularly in cultural production by women of color. There are not many women of color writing about issues that queer women of color face today: therefore, her work is very notable and important to the new generations. In the 1980s her works started to be published. Since she is one of the first and few Chicana/Lesbian writers of our time, she set the stage for younger generations of other minority writers and activists.
Moraga has taught courses in dramatic arts and writing at various universities across the United States and is currently an artist in residence at Stanford University. Her play, Watsonville: Some Place Not Here, performed at the Brava Theatre Company of San Francisco in May, 1996, won the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Fund for New American Plays Award, from the Kennedy center for the Performing Arts. Barbara Smith, Audre Lorde and Moraga started Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press in 1983, a group which did not discriminate against homosexuality, class, or race. it is the first publisher dedicated to the writing of women of color in the United States.
Moraga is currently involved in a Theatre communications group and was the recipient of the NEA Theatre Playwriting Fellowship Award Her plays and publications have won and received national recognition including a TCG Theatre Residency Grant, a National Endowment for the art fellowship for play writing and two Fund for New American Plays Awards in 1993. She was awarded the United States artist Rockefeller Fellowship for literature in 2007.In 2008 she won a Creative Work Fund Award. The following year, in 2009 she received a Gerbode-Hewlett foundation grant for play writing.
(from Wikipedia)
Moraga was one of the few writers to write and introduce the theory on Chicana lesbianism. Her interests include the intersections of gender, sexuality, and race, particularly in cultural production by women of color. There are not many women of color writing about issues that queer women of color face today: therefore, her work is very notable and important to the new generations. In the 1980s her works started to be published. Since she is one of the first and few Chicana/Lesbian writers of our time, she set the stage for younger generations of other minority writers and activists.
Moraga has taught courses in dramatic arts and writing at various universities across the United States and is currently an artist in residence at Stanford University. Her play, Watsonville: Some Place Not Here, performed at the Brava Theatre Company of San Francisco in May, 1996, won the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Fund for New American Plays Award, from the Kennedy center for the Performing Arts. Barbara Smith, Audre Lorde and Moraga started Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press in 1983, a group which did not discriminate against homosexuality, class, or race. it is the first publisher dedicated to the writing of women of color in the United States.
Moraga is currently involved in a Theatre communications group and was the recipient of the NEA Theatre Playwriting Fellowship Award Her plays and publications have won and received national recognition including a TCG Theatre Residency Grant, a National Endowment for the art fellowship for play writing and two Fund for New American Plays Awards in 1993. She was awarded the United States artist Rockefeller Fellowship for literature in 2007.In 2008 she won a Creative Work Fund Award. The following year, in 2009 she received a Gerbode-Hewlett foundation grant for play writing.
(from Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
April 2, 2016
A 'greatest hits' kind of book but, as someone who hadn't read the essays, the organization makes sense. I appreciated her honest reflection regarding the historic struggles she had with Anzaldua. The vulnerability in her writing reminds us that even heroes in our world know they make mistakes. I read slowly because, like most sacred texts, it is important to let each word sink in, that their lessons heal us as the reader much like they were words of healing for the writer.
November 16, 2017
Not an easy read but many interesting insights.
December 18, 2017
Maestra.
March 5, 2023
Son ensayos llenos de rabia, pero, con todo, dudan mucho más de lo que disponen. Aquí está la ansiedad del límite: ¿cómo se acuerpan los intersticios? Críticas frontales al white feminism, a la raza chicana (xicana) que se blanquea, al sistema que lo permite y lo alienta... luego todo matizado desde la amplitud: How do you teach a child the word genocide and still give him reason to love beyond his front door?
Lo personal es político, teoría y praxis bien hiladas. Ahí verán.
El ensayo dedicado a Gloria Anzaldúa requiere lecturas previas (Borderlands, check, y The Bridge... not check... yet), pero está jugosito y chingón.
Lo personal es político, teoría y praxis bien hiladas. Ahí verán.
El ensayo dedicado a Gloria Anzaldúa requiere lecturas previas (Borderlands, check, y The Bridge... not check... yet), pero está jugosito y chingón.
July 20, 2021
I kind of shouldn't, based on who I am, but I can't help but hate Chicano Literature and writings. It's the same thing over, and over, and over again. I'm so sorry. I'm tired of reading about oppressed Mexican-Americans who speak English and Spanglish and grew up in poverty and a broken family. They're often gay, too. And I can't relate.
The writing is not bad at all (although the Spanglish annoys me), I just don't like it. I can't relate and I don't like it.
The writing is not bad at all (although the Spanglish annoys me), I just don't like it. I can't relate and I don't like it.
January 28, 2018
This book is deeply personal, and reflects on so many aspects of Moraga's life and relationships as a queer chicana feminist. The hurt she feels for diasporic people is evident. There are great pieces but it is, more than anything, like a personal diary. For other readers like me, who prefer a more outward perspective, this might not be the most enjoyable read.
January 22, 2023
i read the expert of Still Loving in the (Still) War Years on keeping queer queer (pg.175) and the talks of how queer Black and Brown people had to show the difference of how the idealism of being about their culture and still embracing their queerness affected them. such a beautiful piece that reads super easy and able to discuss the difference of white and POC queerness through out the years!
November 26, 2016
I bought this book last spring, but reading it bit by bit after the election, Moraga's book has been the best medicine I have found for the various heridas abiertas of being a queer xicana in this country.
June 1, 2011
Find my review for Lambda Literary here.
Want to read
August 2, 2011I couldn't resist buying this over the weekend!
July 21, 2015
This book definitely left me with a lot of food for thought and notes on the margins.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews