Essay: Chicano Art in California

Sample Essay

The Chicano experience in the United States of America

The Chicano experience can be understood today mainly through the ancestral heritage of Mexicans in the United States. This history stretches over thousands of years and was mainly influenced by the European, Indian and African influences. For many Chicanos, they have been rooted in America since the premise of Mayflower. It was the Chicano Civil Rights Movement of the 1970s which fought to regain their identity and educate their upper classes.

Their objective was not only to gain equality and communal justice for Mexican-Americans. We cannot illustrate the Chicano experience in America through a single story or explanation immediately as no one narrative can detain the spirit and heart of any ethnic group in America[1]. The Chicano experience is diverse, multifaceted and energetic.

[1] Clifford, James.  1988. The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.