Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in I, Rigoberta Menchú, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Tolerance vs. Resistance
Class, Race, and Inequality
Ancestors, Tradition, and Community
Gender and Sexuality
Language, Education, and Power
Spirituality, Nature, and the Sacredness of Life
Summary
Analysis
Rigoberta had not heard from her family in over a year, but she learned to find support among the compañeros of the CUC, who became like a family to her. As she stayed in different people’s houses while moving from community to community, she discovered that some people’s experiences were even worse than what she experienced as a child. When staying in a particularly cold village, she saw a family try to sleep in freezing weather, without a mat or cover. This made her realize that, despite her family’s poverty, she was better off as a child than this family, since everyone in her household had their own mat.
Rigoberta’s description of the CUC as a friendly, warm environment contrasts starkly with what the reader knows about the Guatemalan army, which a hierarchical organization that does not hesitate to kill its own members as punishment. In this way, the CUC has the potential to develop a new form of comradeship based not on fear and domination, but on dialogue and inclusion. Rigoberta’s realization that her family was actually richer than others reveals the importance of learning about other people’s experiences. In doing so, one can contextualize one’s personal experience of suffering within a broader, social, economic, and geographic perspective.
Themes
In the CUC, Rigoberta befriended a ladino teacher who taught her Spanish. She concluded, as she observed his behavior, that not all ladinos were bad. The two of them spent many nights talking together, discussing the peasant struggle and the organization. Rigoberta realized that the system impeded Indians and ladinos from cooperating, even though poor members of each ethnic group lived in the same harsh conditions.
Rigoberta realizes that not all members of an oppressive institution or social group (like the army or the Catholic Church) mean to harm Indians. Despite the widespread racism and discrimination in Guatemalan society, some ladinos actually believe in the defending poor Indian peasants and are willing to devote their lives to the cause.
Themes
Rigoberta notes that, although Indians are the majority in Guatemala, exact statistics are difficult to find, because some Indians no longer take part in ancestral customs and some become members of the middle-class who reject their background. Overall, though, Indians are disproportionately discriminated against. For example, in the market, ladinos always try to trick Indians, knowing that ladinos can make their voice heard, through the law, in more effective ways. Rigoberta realized that, to enact change, ladinos and Indians had to overcome these barriers of discrimination and unite in order to reject a common oppression.
Although Rigoberta is deeply attached to her Maya-Quiché community and customs, she understands that ethnic identity is not necessarily the most important factor in a successful political group. What does matters is gathering as many people as possible, from a diversity of backgrounds, to fight against a harsh social reality: the oppression of Indian peasants. In the same way that she later preconizes cooperation between men and women to fight against machismo, she believes in dialogue between Indians and ladinos to effect long-term social change.
Themes
Rigoberta recalls her father’s injunction against schooling, explaining that schools forced Indians to think differently. For example, they taught the arrival of the Spaniards as a victorious “conquest,” explaining that Indians did not know how to fight and killed horses instead of humans. Indignant, Rigoberta knew that the opposite was true. She called this system “false education,” capable of teaching people literacy but focused on instilling in them the same mode of thinking as the authorities.
Rigoberta’s criticism of official schooling sheds light on the fact that history is not an objective narrative. Rather, it’s one that’s shaped by the interests and beliefs of those in power—which, in Guatemala, means excluding the perspective of Indigenous groups. Treating a savage act of colonization as a “victory” mirrors the current interests of the country’s brutal, political and economic elite: to silence and kill Indians defending their own land.
Themes
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Rigoberta contrasts that education with the learning what is relevant to one’s community. Indians usually keep much of their knowledge secret: they do not talk about their self-defense strategies and keep their opinions to themselves when priests come to the village. The goal is to convince those in power that they are not thinking or plotting anything. Given that their views have never been taken seriously in the public sphere, they prefer to keep their opinions to themselves. They hide their identity as a form of resistance, even if this leads others to believe that they are unintelligent.
In light of her own community’s refusal to communicate their thoughts in a way that might be misunderstood or misrepresented by authorities, Rigoberta’s decision to dictate her autobiography in Spanish stands out as a potentially controversial choice. However, this decision suggests that silence is not always the best method: sharing one’s worldview—while keeping the community’s most precious secrets—can help educate people and enact political change.
Themes
