Immigration Corridos
 

Tijuana:  A massive amount of traffic  waiting to cross the border.
 
This webpage analyzes the Immigration Corrido genre. Corridos provide an invaluable documentation of the Mexican-American history and Mexican-American experiences. The issues of immigration and migration are one of many social issues experienced and sung in corridos by Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. Our group discovered the immigration issue to be important not only in the historical documentation of corridos, but also as an issue of contemporary importance. We will explore the experiences of Mexicans immigrating into the United States from Mexico that have been passed on by corridistas. In our exploration of this topic it is important, we note, the academic definition of a corrido and how the songs we have selected either do, or do not completely conform to the academic parameters set for the tradition of the corridos.
 
The idea to make this project on corridos dealing with immigration came about from two reasons. First of all, this was an opportunity to study and present new corridos. These corridos were recorded as recent as 1997 and don't fall under the current trend of the popular narco-corridos. Second of all and most important, this was an opportunity to deal with the very real and serious issue that is immigration from Central and South America into the United States.
 
The recent attacks on immigrants in California have put this issue in the newspapers and television for America to consume. For those people who come from border towns along the US-Mexican border, immigration is nothing new but to many other Americans, this issue is one too distant. By studying these corridos, one can understand and see what immigrants go through to live in the United States. We were fortunate to have corridos that touched on many different ideas, issues, and dilemmas facing immigrants today. These corridos tell of the tough decisions to migrate to the US, the unexpected difficulties of life in the US, the decision to assimilate for a better future, and the opportunity to return home after years of work.
 
Along with these new corridos, we've included an immigration corrido that comes from 1929. Before we go any further, we have to state that the new corridos we use in this project might be called by some border-line corridos because they don't follow the format of the traditional corridos. However, we consider them corridos because of the true themes they deal with and for reasons touched upon later. El Deportado follows the traditional format of the heroic and revolutionary corridos that Americo Paredes dedicated his life to and we've included it so the two kinds can be compared and appreciated by all.
 
This page was created by
Genaro Jasso
Guadalupe Navarro
Megan Meece
Sara Burns
 
Jaula de Oro
Tumba del Mojado
Mojado Acaudalado
Mis Dos Patrias
El Deportado
 
Bibliography
 
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