A Xicana Codex of Changing Consciousness

Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011. First edition (presumed; no earlier dates stated). Dark red octavo, xxii, 250 pages, b&w illustrations, 24 cm. Extremely mild rubbing to spine head and foot, small coffee stain to fore-edge, faint soiling to fore-edges, else near fine(-). Paperback. ISBN: 9780822349778

"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. She 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."--Back cover. Contents: A XicanaDyke codex of changing consciousness --; From inside the first world: on 9/11 and women-of-color feminism --; An irrevocable promise: staging the story Xicana --; What is left of us --; MeXicana blues --; Weapons of the weak: on fear and political resistance --; California dreaming --; Cuento xicano --; Indígena as scribe: the (w)rite to remember --; The altar of my undoing --; Aguas sagradas --; And it is all these things that are our grief: eulogy for Marsha Gómez --; Poetry of heroism: a tribute to Audre Lorde and Pat Parker --; The salt that cures: remembering Gloria Anzaldúa --; South Central farmers --; The other face of (im)migration: in conversation with West Asian feminists --; Floricanto --; Modern-day malinches --; What's race gotta do with it?: on the election of Barack Obama --; This benighted nation we name home: on the fortieth anniversary of ethnic studies --; Still loving in the (still) war years: on keeping queer queer --; Epilogo: Xicana mind, beginner mind. --; Appendix: Sola, pero bien acompañada: the art of Celia Herrera Rodriguez. American literature -- Mexican American authors.