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Carlos García’s Bodyguard
Sixteenth-century Maya-Quiché warrior Tecún Umán was killed during a battle against Spanish colonizers. Although he is celebrated as a warrior in Guatemalan schools, Rigoberta explains that, to the Indian community, his acts are not a fact of the past. For Indians, the struggle for his community’s survival continues today. Honoring him as a hero devalues his work by relegating him to the past and thus making him irrelevant in the present. Rigoberta’s discussion concerning the role of ancestors in Indian society highlights the gap between Indigenous traditions and official Guatemalan schooling, which borrows elements of Indian culture without fully understanding and respecting them.
Tecún Umán Quotes in I, Rigoberta Menchú
The I, Rigoberta Menchú quotes below are all either spoken by Tecún Umán or refer to Tecún Umán. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 29
Quotes
In the schools they often celebrate the day of Tecún Umán. Tecún Umán is the Quiché hero who is said to have fought the Spanish and then been killed by them. Well, there is a fiesta each year in the schools. They commemorate the day of Tecún Umán as the national hero of the Quichés. But we don’t celebrate it, primarily because our parents say that this hero is not dead. […] His birthday is commemorated as something which represented the struggle of those times. But for us the struggle still goes on today, and our suffering more than ever. We don’t want it said that all that happened in the past, but that it exists today, and so our parents don’t let us celebrate it. We know this is our reality even though the ladinos tell it as if it were history.
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Explanation and Analysis:
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Tecún Umán Quotes in I, Rigoberta Menchú
The I, Rigoberta Menchú quotes below are all either spoken by Tecún Umán or refer to Tecún Umán. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 29
Quotes
In the schools they often celebrate the day of Tecún Umán. Tecún Umán is the Quiché hero who is said to have fought the Spanish and then been killed by them. Well, there is a fiesta each year in the schools. They commemorate the day of Tecún Umán as the national hero of the Quichés. But we don’t celebrate it, primarily because our parents say that this hero is not dead. […] His birthday is commemorated as something which represented the struggle of those times. But for us the struggle still goes on today, and our suffering more than ever. We don’t want it said that all that happened in the past, but that it exists today, and so our parents don’t let us celebrate it. We know this is our reality even though the ladinos tell it as if it were history.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
