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It appears that abrujo slipped into the consciousness of Bob Conder, the superintendent of the Norwood Schools, taking control of his impulse to continue what was materializing as a modern day witch hunt. According to an article printed in the Rocky Mountain News on Saturday, February 5th, 2005 regarding the banning of “Bless Me Ultima,” from the district, the superintendent has apologized to the “students, parents, staff and residents.” He has formally recanted his decision to keep prolific writer Rudolpho Anaya’s book on the shelf until a committee can determine its utility in the curriculum.
One has to hope that those chosen to review the book possess the spiritual, cultural and philosophical understanding of Indio/Mexicano indigenous healing referred to as curanderismo. The lack of understanding will only further muddy the already mucky minds of those who are controlling the curricula in Norwood. Conder’s hasty decision to toss the books into the trashcan at the suggestion of a couple of suspicious characters was headed towards a budding controversy over one of our most basic democratic civil rights protected by the constitution of the United States, freedom of the press.
The young upcoming progressives who staged the sit in Norwood Schools over the hullabaloo ought to be commended for their courage to use nonviolent protest as a method of social change.
Although there was an initial charade claiming that the profanity used in the book was the reason to ban the book, the real diatribe against Anaya’s book has to do with the current cultural wars in American society regarding religiosity. According to the library association as reported in the Rocky Mountain News the book, “… has, many profane and obscene references, vulgar Spanish words and glorifies witchcraft and death.” The Library association ought to also make an apology to New Mexican Professor Emeritus Rudolpho Anaya as well for its insensitivity.
Characterizing the book as the glorification of witchcraft and death is really a misnomer lacking understanding about curanderismo. For 13 years, I worked with one of the most well-respected and powerful curanderas in the country, Diana Velazquez. Incidentally, she was one of few healers who worked in a formal mental health center. A re-education process was used to deal with the professional staff that did not understand curanderismo, often times referring to it as witchcraft and charlatans at work. The reality is that there are impostors in all disciplines, even medical science.
Indigenous healers with close relationships to la tierra and the many healing plants and their properties that come from Grandmother Earth are experts in natural medicine and remedios that have been used for centuries. Many of our grandmothers used them to cure ailments. Should we consider them witches?
As for death, it is a reality. The mystery of death and the taking of el alma into another existence has mystified humankind since creation. It creates perpetual anxiety within human beings as they ponder over what happens to el alma after death. The glorification of another deity called science cannot solve this riddle. Perhaps, faith has something to do with it.
In Anaya’s book, as seen from the eyes of Antonio, a 7-year old growing up in New Mexico, the classical struggle over personal power and institutional power emerges as one of the themes as the Catholic Church negates the power demonstrated by Ultima, la Curandera. The symbol of el tecolote, the nagual in its magical form, is wisdom and knowledge.
Indigenous healers have practiced holistic healing for centuries. They are the medicine people of the Southwest y Las Americas. I conversed with Curandera Diana Velazquez who stated that, “it was very culturally insensitive on the part of the superintendent to do this. Throwing away the books is not going to make curanderas disappear. They have been and always will be a part of the Indio/Mexicano culture.” She further stated that Anaya’s book “is one of the most accurate portrayals of curanderismo that is out there.” She differentiated other books written about curanderismo as written by people who truly do not have a grasp on the culture.
In “Medicine Women, Curanderas and Women Doctors,” written by Perrone, Stockel and Krueger, they discuss the role of curanderas in Indian and Mexican cultures. El Don or the gift of healing for the curandera/o begins in the womb. In the book, Dr. James Jaramillo, a New Mexican physician states that there is a flip side to this known as brujeria or witchcraft. In the classical battle of good and evil, curanderos/as have a choice about how to use their gift. They can use it for malevolent reasons or for healing purposes. Conder and company chose to gravitate towards brujeria without researching or understanding the philosophical underpinnings of curanderismo.
At the time that I directed psychiatric services in Southwest Denver, I also taught Chicano Philosophy and Psychology at Saint Thomas Theological Seminary in the evenings. I recollect the Dean of the School, Fr. Prudencio Rodriquez, encouraging me to invite Diana Velazquez to lecture the seminarians. I facilitated very thought provoking and intellectual discussions between students from religious multi-denominational sectors and Diana.
I also recollect priests who had taken the class calling the clinic on many occasions requesting intervention from La Curandera. I think that we have come a long way from the paranoid thinking that obviously filled the minds of the detractors from Norwood whose main agenda seemed to be presto digital, that is, “now you see it, now you don’t.”
The real issue has to do with medical and educational hegemony practiced by Western medical practitioners and educational pundits that is becoming insidious as the attacks against indigenous healers and Ethnic Studies continue and extreme conservatism permeates American society
Conder should have the children read about the pharmaceutical biopiracy and theft that Americans have practiced in patenting and institutionalizing natural medicine stolen from Las Americas and brought into the United States. That might be of interest to the children as well.
Let’s call off the witch hunt.
Ramon Del Castillo, Ph.D. is an Independent Journalist.
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