Greasers, gringos and wetbacks: ventriloquizing the U.S. - Mexico borderlands in Gloria Anzaldúa's dramatic monologues

Abstract

This article focuses on two dramatic monologues by Chicana writer Gloria Anzaldúa. In ‘We Call Them Greasers’ and ‘sobre piedras con lagartijos’, Anzaldúa uses the voices of an Anglo male colonist and a male border-crosser to ventriloquize the colonial legacy of the U.S.–Mexico Borderlands. Anzaldúa harnesses the oral possibilities of dramatic monologue to use other[ed] voices across race, gender and class divides to mediate the complex border identities produced in the U.S.–Mexico borderlands. Through close readings of the two poems, this article explores the ways in which Anzaldúa underscores the patriarchal, macho vocalities of her male speakers from her perspective as a Chicana feminist writer.