Teaching about Life through Dance
Rosa Ramírez Guerrero
Birth: November 14, 1934

audio

"The Mind Has to Be Opened like a Parachute"

I want to hear about all aspects of your career. Let's start with childhood experiences—things that you had as a child. Tell me about your life then.

Okay. I believe that, as I was telling you before, we're all here just a short while. And to me, I had a beautiful childhood. My mother and my father loved me very much. As a matter of fact, I was my dad's favorite. And I started dancing when I was about three years old. I used to get on my dad's feet and jump and hear the beautiful music and feel the beat with the movement of his feet. And hear the music:mazurkas,¹⁷schottisches,¹⁸ varsovians,¹⁹ waltzes, ²⁰ pasodobles, ²¹ rumbas.²² It was a wonderful combination of both the United States' cultures! I'm not going to say "American." American—we're all Americans; North, South, Central American; and the Native American is the first American. We have kind of erased him in the whole concept of Americana. But, anyway, I'm just saying that it was the United States' folk dances, brought from the European, and in the Mexican folk dances brought from the Spanish; and the mixing eclectically, a confluence of both. So I was very lucky to have had love and family and culture and faith very young. And I still have it. Even though my mom and dad are gone, they're in my heart. With every music that I feel, I can flash back to 1938 to 1940 to 1941, when the Second World War started. I used to jitterbug, also, as a little girl, and I used to do exhibitions. And so it was wonderful to be able to balance both cultures.

I was telling you about a friend of mine, Doctor Oscar Martinez, from Arizona. He calls the border "the Cultural Chameleons," the people that have to adapt. And I think that's what we have to do. We have to adapt to both cultures. Especially on the border, especially being Hispanic, Latino, Chicano, whatever we have been called or society has called us or we like to call ourselves. Dancing has been a tremendous part of my life. And I have been able to be a cultural chameleon, with the dance, with the music, with history, philosophy, with the linguistics, with all aspects.

When I was a little girl, I used to be punished for speaking Spanish—the whole Southwest was! And that was English only. These English-only people are trying to force it again. But we went through that before. They used to pull my braids! Or they used to pinch me, or they used to lock us in closets, or they used to make us eat chile [peppers].

Rosa Ramírez Guerrero at age 3, 1937

As a matter of fact, for about the last twenty-five years, I've been doing documentary researches on different people—the way they were treated, and how they were punished for speaking Spanish. In Arizona it was one way, in Texas another way, and New Mexico another way, and California another way. In Texas, in El Paso we had the Spanish detention hall. One of our high schools in El Paso—Bowie High School—was the last school in the United States that was subpoenaed by the United States Government for punishing Spanish-speaking people with detention hall. And we were also forced—if you could write—you had to write, "I will not speak that dirty language. I will not speak that dirty..." a hundred times, five hundred times, a thousand! Sometimes, depending on how racist a teacher was or if she was in menopause. Okay? [laughter]

Because we had all kinds. Some of our teachers, for example, Mrs. French, my kindergarten teacher, couldn't speak a word of Spanish. I couldn't speak a word of English. What joined us together? What made me love her and what made me never forget her—this is 1940, El Paso, Texas—is because she put on a beautiful, beautiful piece of music. She wound up the victrola^23—the old victrola, which now is obsolete for many people, but for us it was our big 78 records. She put [on] Stars and Stripes Forever. She gave every child little sticks and little instruments, and we went around [sings Stars and Stripes Forever], and I loved it, because I had heard the John Philip Sousa²⁴ music. I was given music at home. I was given love and culture and folklore and traditions and customs and life and history.

Rosa's Ballet Folklorico performs in Washington,D.C.

But I thought everybody had gotten that opportunity. No. I grew up, and I said, "How sad that these people don't know anything," you know. And it's very sad. I was very lucky, very rich. And then my father used to tell me, "The Americano, the white American, is losing his culture. I don't want you to lose your culture." This is very young that he was telling me. And I said, "Papa, what is culture? What is culture?" I couldn't see it, I couldn't taste it, I couldn't feel it, I couldn't touch it. I wanted to really, really do something with culture, not knowing that I was going to be involved later on so, so deeply with culture. Culture comes from the word cultivate-to cultivate a person. And also it's a way of life. And everybody's culture is beautiful. Everybody! We have to be…I think the mind has to be opened like a parachute. When a parachute opens, it functions. When the mind closes, it does not function; it's like a closed parachute. And many times we have Archie Bunkers²⁵ in all cultures. We have Archie Bunkers in the black culture, in the African-American, definitely, and, of course, our Hispanic cultures. Yes. And I would say that the dancing, to me, was so beautiful because I was already getting the European background, plus the indigenous, plus the Spanish, plus the Mexican before I went to kindergarten. And yet teachers called me culturally deprived. I mean, who is culturally deprived? No one is! Culturally different, yes. Culturally beautiful, we are. I think all of us…when God put us here, he made us so special, so unique, so beautiful. And that's how I use dance and music to reach children who feel so bad about themselves—their color, their size, their tremendous handicaps, where they are quadriplegic or they're retarded or blind or deaf—all children are beautiful. All people are beautiful. But we have such a cold heart. We have developed such a cold heart in the United States that we have not opened. We need to teach it to the children. They are going to be the future, and so I use the dance and the music as a medium to convey my message of cultural harmony, understanding, love, unity, et cetera. All of the positives!

I'm a very positive person, even with all the burdens that I have had as a woman, as a Chicana, as a dancer, as a artist, as a Texan!—because [we] brag so much, you know, so we're not liked in many other states. [laughter] Anyway, I would say, and people ask me, "How did you break through all these?" I said, "Every day is another day." I said, "This is 1995, we're going into the year—the twenty-first century—and we're still there breaking the barrier." Because women still are behind. We are the largest oppressed, silent majority in the world. Very oppressed. And people do not say anything. And I speak for all women of all colors that are still put down. I want to lift their heart, their soul, their self-esteem. I want to lift the children. I want to lift the people that are out there. They are called "handicapped," but they are not handicapped; they're just different. They just have a different type of a barrier they have to penetrate through our system. But, if I reach the senior citizen too—because I'm getting up there: I'll be sixty-one. You know, everybody labels us in a certain thing. We're just people. And the word "senior citizen," my mother died at ninety—she was always eighteen years old! Had more spunk, more enthusiasm, more spirit than girls at eighteen. And it's just—it's what you're born with and what you can give to people. If God gives us that enthusiasm and that zest for life, let us give it to others.

Rosa Guerrero at a festival in El Paso

We all can do it in different areas, in different ways, in different curriculums; it's a gift that we all have. We all have a gift. Some people never, never, never are given the opportunity of really opening up that Pandora's box of gifts. And we all have a Pandora's box, beautiful, of good positive gifts and talents. And because our self-esteem is put down because of our language, our culture, our size, our color, our gender, whatever, we do not grow. We are inhibited so sadly. And in a closet, many times, I've seen some of these beautiful ladies all over the United States that have so much talent, and yet, they've been oppressed so much, they cannot function. I don't care what age—we could still turn on people. And some people have been turned on. I'll tell you a story of Lucita Avila in El Paso.

Lucita is eighty-seven years old. She started dancing with me about eighteen years ago. And she said that all her life she wanted to dance, but it was a no-no in her family in Durango, Mexico. Only the bad girls do it, you know. Only the hustlers and whatever, anyway, the hookers, and so it was a no-no. Then she married, and she was oppressed so horribly over fifty years by this man until he died! She started taking dancing with me, and she was already seventy-something. She said, "I am just beginning to live." The dance gave her that. And I taught her dancing; I taught her how to play the castanets,²⁶ and here I had the senior citizens reliving themselves. Because some of them had never had the opportunity to really live—as a child, as a teenager, as a young adult. And it's sad that they're born in this world to be oppressed by their husbands or by their own family. And we do; we have people like that. And I want to go and tap humanity. And that's my job with the dance and the music.

Rosa at opening of El Paso elementary school named in her honor

I call America a tapestry, a mosaic, a salad bowl, a rainbow, a fruit basket. It is not a melting pot. And I tell that in my film, Tapestry II. I talk to the students at Rosa Guerrero School—I have a Rosa Guerrero Elementary named for me, and I'm very proud of that. And I told them, I said, "You know, when I was a little girl, I refused, when my teachers told me, a melting pot! I don't want to melt." And I am unmeltable! Carlos Fuentes²⁷ says there are some people that don't want to melt, and they are "unmeltables"—and those are going to be the survivors. And I feel that there are Native Americans and African Americans and all people of all colors, of all ethnic groups, that are unmeltable. We don't have to assimilate and lose the traditions and the customs and the folklore and our language. My father used to sit me down to conjugate²⁸ the Spanish language. And it was beautiful. And he says, "Hija, let me hear hacer in the preterite."²⁹ And, ah, it was beautiful, because he was Socratic.³⁰

Even though my dad was an alcoholic, I still loved him so much. I don't—we don't judge—and we're not to judge anybody, especially our parents. Our parents have done the best they could with us. And sometimes we might agree or disagree, but they still love us. In spite of their faults and their errors, they still love us—unconditional love. And we do the same with our own kids. Because our own kids are the worst judges of all. They judge us. I can reach thousands and thousands, [but] my own kids [say], "Mom, you're crazy. Mom, how do you know, Mom? You're just my Mom." I mean, because we take each other for granted. We take our husbands for granted, our loved ones for granted, our children for granted, [and] they take momma for granted. And my grandchildren… I have five grandchildren; I love them. One of them, my eldest, Anthony, he says, "Grandma, you're not a regular grandma; you're crazy!" [laughter] And I am crazy. I'm crazy for living; I'm crazy for life; let me be crazy every day. And I love it; I love it because God just put me on this earth such a short time. You know, the world is supposed to be twelve billion years old, and we're embryos, all of us.

Anne Richards and Rosa Guerrero, Texas Women Hall of Fame Induction, 1993

Yes, we're embryos. And we have so much to learn. And sometimes—until we're maybe sixty, seventy, eighty years old—we are using the creativity and the potential that we didn't have time [to develop] because we were raising our kids. And all these scientists and all the composers and all the writers and all these super-talented people, sometimes, at that age, they're just rediscovering history and science and units and composition and theory, and so every day is to me a beautiful day. I never get bored. I never…there's so much to do.

Tell me, Rosa, about school, because you were a teacher for a long time.

Yes. I taught twenty years, and I left in 1980, but I'm still involved a lot with the schools. Very much! I like to go to all levels from the pre-kinder, two-year-old, early childhood. I do creative dance with the children; I do movement education; I do bilingual concepts that nobody has ever touched. Because I feel that a child can learn a language through movement; that's my theory. And if I had time, I would go and work on the dissertation for a Ph.D. with that, but I don't have time. I want to enjoy my grandchildren now and my writings and my videotapes. And I do modern dance and jazz and tap dancing and ethnic and folk and all of that.

Rosa with dancers

I become a different individual when I hear the music. When I hear the Jewish horah,³¹ I become Jewish; when I hear the black gospel songs, I become black, I become a slave. I become that part of the world. When it's jazz or jive, I become an African American in New York with all of that stuff. It's the same with other ethnic folk dances. You know, I just become—especially the Native American—when I hear the drum, whether it's the drum from the Aztecs or the Maya or the Inca music from South America, or the North American music, something inside of me—my heart starts beating the drum beat. I love them; I'm a drummer and I'm a percussionist. So I love instruments. And I feel that the drum is the oldest instrument of mankind; so is the dance. The dance is the mother, the mother of the arts. I call music the father. And that's my own interpretation. Dancing has been a part of all mankind since the beginning of time. People danced because they loved it, but it was always very much a part of their culture, an integral part. They dance for the sun and the moon and stars and the rain and the crops, for the corn; they're still dancing the corn dance in many parts of Mexico and the United States. They dance for the beginning of life, for the babies. They dance for death and funerals. They dance for the animals, for the buffalo, for the deer, for the eagle. They dance for everything that existed. They dance in a circle for peace and harmony that we need now!

More than ever, the United States needs peace and harmony and understanding of each other. You know, instead of going with love, we're degenerating with racism and ugliness; and you can see it with all the violence that's going around. Everybody's trying to be a threat, you know. Everybody. We should not fear each other. We're developing a threat-type of a theory, which hurts me. Because we're here for such a short time. Not to hurt. We're developing this horrible feeling of lack of respect and trust. Beautiful words—respect and trust are beautiful words. And we need it with the children. Parents need to really indoctrinate kids to love and respect themselves and others. If we start with hatred at home, we're going to grow up with it. That child is going to be an adult—very, very ugly with his heart and his mind—not knowing that he's really, really doing wrong because he's been indoctrinated that way. Like Hitler; very dangerous, very dangerous. And we're getting that concept.

I believe we're having a reversal. Especially with Proposition 187,³² all of this is coming back as a danger sign. As I said in my film, "The enemy is not communism any more. The enemy is not the illegal immigrants. The enemy is us!" Violence and drugs and racism and filth and pornography and the media many times—with all these things that are happening—and the broken families. Because I love children, I've seen so many of them, you know, without any love. Parents need to know that, if they're going to bring a child into the world, they need to be responsible for their actions and for their upbringing and not to just turn the child off when they want to. They need to really direct all their parenting. We need more parenting-type of programs. And I believe we could have senior citizens to bring their input. I believe that we could bring mothers that have all kinds of kids. A mother that has just one, she is a mother; she knows. But we could be in an interaction of "what is parenting?" Because we all have different types. Our own culture has a way of parenting, but parenting is love. The basic essence of all humanity is love. If you love that child with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind, you will not abuse that child. The United States is number one in violence, drugs, abuse, divorces—everything in the world that's ugly. And it's not nice.

Back left to right: siblings Pete Jr., Nadine, and Daniel Ramírez; front left to right: Bill; Rosa, six months, sitting on the lap of her mother, Josefina Ramírez; George, c. 1935

Something has happened in this country to the concept of love.

That's it, exactly. Exactly. And so my film, Tapestry, is peace and love all together. And even though people think it's too mushy, mushy, we need the mushy, mushiness. We really do. We're getting very cold. We're getting very callous. The culture of narcissism has been here quite a while, and it's taking over. Our kids are very selfish. They're not satisfied with one toy, one thing—"I want more, I want more! I want!" How much more can we have? We have freedom! We have liberty! We have the Constitution; we have the Bill of Rights! How much more can we ask? We've had it! We're going to lose it if we don't really channel ourselves in harmony and love and peace.

You were talking a minute ago about bilingual concepts. What do you mean by bilingual concepts?

I was brought up with all Spanish first at home. Everything! The whole media and the radio—we didn't have television. The radio all was Spanish. The magazines, the newspapers, our conversations, whether there were fights or love or whatever at home, it was all Spanish. When we went to school, it was all English. It was forced English on us because we couldn't [weren't allowed to] speak the Spanish.

But the thing about it is that, through movement, I feel that a person can learn another language. That's my theory. And I feel that, for example, I can teach verbs and prepositions and direction, perceptual movement education, in Spanish and adapt it to English; or in English [and] adapt it to Spanish. I've taught bilingual education. But I also taught English as a second language. My students, for example, do a little unit with song. [sings] "A verb is action and action is doing. A verb is action and action is doing." And we get a choo-choo train line, and that person in the front does the verb. "What am I doing? Well, I'm combing my hair." Okay. I comb my hair, you comb your hair, they comb. Of course, in the English language, it's present, past, and past participle, so all we know is, "Today I am combing my hair; yesterday I combed my hair; tomorrow I will comb or I shall comb my hair." That's all. But in Spanish—Lord have mercy! We have so many tenses. [Speaks in Spanish] And on and on and on because Spanish just grows. But that's the concept. And in prepositions too. I have a concept where I use my beautiful…well, it's like a yardstick but it's elasticized yarn—yarn. And I call it elastic—elasticized so that prepositions could be done through movement. And they learned all kinds of prepositions with that thing. Well, that's my theory that I did maybe twenty, twenty-five years ago. I never put them in any words or whatever, because of time. Teachers are always busy. Very busy. And collecting! I have boxes and boxes of collections of this—the Native American culture, the Jewish culture, the so-and-so culture—because I became very culture enthusiastic. And that was my activity. And then this is for dance; this is for bilingual education; this is multicultural education; and this is for so-and-so. So I have all these boxes, and my husband says, "Why don't we have a bonfire? And it would be wonderful." And I said, "No, someday ..." But you see, the someday sometimes doesn't come to some people; they die.

Members of Rosa Guerrero Dance Company in El Paso Parade

I did my film, Tapestry, in '74, and it won first place in the nation for its documentary. This July 3, 1995, I just finished another one. I still owe a lot of money. El Paso does not have—we're the fifth poorest city in the nation—[we don't have] the money that San Antonio, Houston, Austin has. And arts are at the bottom of the whole cesspool! They do not fund the arts. And then, also, the different foundations in Texas—I applied to about twenty, and I was turned down. For whatever reason, I don't know. People don't know what Tapestry is; they don't know me, really. My city might know me. You know, some people might know me. But I am not Madonna,³³ and I don't care to be Madonna. I went into education with dance because I felt that I could reach kids. I went through the prejudices, and I didn't want kids to go through that. I said, "When I become a teacher," and this is in the third or fourth grade I wanted to be a teacher," I am not going to punish my kids because they're culturally different, linguistically different, just different. I will love them, I will teach them, I will motivate them, I will inspire them, I will discipline them, because discipline is part of love." And that is what is needed right now. Discipline is part of love. But there is so much to be done.

Rosa as a young woman

We're just tapping bilingual concepts, and we've been bilingual for years! I mean, how many years have we been bilingual? And, you know, on the border, many of us didn't cross the border; the border crossed us! You know, with the Treaty of Guadalupe
Hildago³⁴ in 1848 and all that. We were already here! I mean, it just crossed us, and many of our ancestors all over Tejas, New Mexico, and Arizona, California, they were already here. They were already here. And these people in the eastern part of the United States, they don't understand the geography. They don't understand that Santa Fe is the oldest capital in the United States, and the oldest city is St. Augustine. They don't understand that Esteban³⁵ was the first black Moor that came with Juan de Oñate,³⁶ going all the way, looking for the Cities of Cibola.³⁷ There's so much to learn from each other. But we don't want to learn. We want to learn just ours; just American history; just the colonies. Everybody's history is beautiful. What about our Native American? What have we done to them? A genocide of genocide. The Spaniards came for G's—for God, for gold, for greed and glory! Among them were good people, among them were bad, and among them were ugly. Just like our society right now. Ugly, ugly. They treated them horribly. And they put them down, even for the corn, for example. They put them down because they ate corn. Because Columbus took many products to Spain; corn was one of them, to fatten the animals. So they looked [at] corn for the animals only. And many years afterwards the Spaniards would look at corn as an inferior product and step on the Native Americans and say, "Look at these savages eating corn!" not knowing that this product was going to be the basis of Mesoamerica, the basic staple food. And in my film it was taken out, that certain unit on the corn, where Mexican people and the Indian people are made out of corn. We're made out of corn! And I said, "Look at the wonderful product: you get nixtamal, which is the pulp; and you get atole, which is your gruel; you get your wonderful, wonderful pozole, which is your hominy; and then you get tortillas, tacos, enchiladas, tamales, gorditas, and gordotas. And you get the brand products like corn flakes and corn nuts and popcorn and cornbread, honey chil' [southern accent]. Because in every culture the corn is part of yourself, and it's beautiful. We shouldn't step on it, you know. And we do.

We step on people because they have an accent. You know what Ricardo Montalban says? He says, "He or she who has an accent knows another language." But we want to speak so prim and proper that it is standard American English. Hey, in Texas alone we have five or six different forms of English. [drawling] With Muleshoe, Texas, and the way they have the English spoken and the way they drawl their different types of things. And there's the Bay area and the eastern part and the western part. It's beautiful to have an accent—that is you! Whether it's European, whether it's Texan, whether it's Cuban, Puerto Rican, or Spanish from Mexico, all accents are beautiful. And I can go on and on and on! [laughter]

After the interview, Rosa continued to comment on various subjects of interest.

About the rebozo:

Rebozo³⁸ is part of the woman. Whether it's the babuska or a shawl or a mantilla—it is a woman. It is the femininity. It gives us a dignity. I think it's a dignity—part of what's missing. No matter how old. And I tell the girls nowadays, "You're not appreciating the genuine femininity of what we are. Because you're going so fast." I said, "Enjoy who we are," I said, "as women." I said, "No matter who you are, we all have dignity and deserve dignity." And to me the rebozo gives the dignity.

About self-esteem:

So I said, "No one is going to put me down, no!" My dad says, "You are beautiful, you are my child, God made you, and nobody, nobody is going to put my little girl down." So, the reaffirmation of your self-concept begins at home.

But if your parents put you down because of your size and your color and you're retarded and you're this and you're dumb, that child doesn't grow! Parents also need to know that they have to be the first teachers. They don't have to have a formal education, but just being there for them.

There are women in the world that nobody has ever…I say unsung heroes and sheroes. Maya Angelou³⁹ calls them sheroes. And to me, my mother was that person. She used to cure us with all the herbs and cure us with the holistic medicine and give limpias.⁴⁰ She believed there was evil in the world and in darkness. And there is, because the devil's always there and envy and all of that. And when people—they call it "the evil eye"—she believed in all of that. There were certain things that she would cure with. She was very psychic. And a lot of people loved her for that. And she was a fortuneteller also.

About doing things with her parents:

I just had special parents. I used to go to Juárez to dances, [they] used to love to dance. That I used to see them dance tangos and the pasodobles—oh!—nobody could dance the pasodobles like my mother [sings and snaps fingers]. I mean the people….and I said, "That's my mom! That's my dad!" We used to go to the bullfights every Sunday, every Sunday! When they were going to kill the bull, I would cover myself because I didn't like that. Because I love animals. But I loved the fanfare, and I loved the music, and I loved the passes.

About using music in teaching:

When I hear the music with the castanets, I become Spanish. But then, when I hear the drum and the flutes, I become Indian—Native American. And I asked my dad, "What am I? People say I'm not Spanish, and I'm not Indian." And he says, "You're Mexican. And this is the Mexican." I tell this to the children, I say, "When God made a Mexican, he got an indigenous person and he got a Spaniard, he mixed them together and made delicious guacamole! That's what we are!" And they just go, "Oh, I'm made out of guacamole." And I said, "Guacamole turns black when you don't believe in yourself, when you drop out of school, when you hurt yourself with drugs and filth." I said, "The guacamole needs to stay fresh all of the time—and that's you."

Multicultural education since the 1960s has become a formal field of study that addresses the needs of people living in a culturally diverse democratic society. To learn more about this topic, consult: Gollnick, Donna M., and Philip C. Chinn. Multicultural Education in a Pluralistic Society. 2nd ed. Columbus, Ohio: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Co., 1986. This 291-page textbook presents an introduction to the concepts and cultures that compose multicultural society. After examining each of the subcultures that make up our society, the book concludes with a presentation of the strategies that compose the field of multicultural education. To learn more about Hispanic music and culture, discover: Juan Bautista Rael, 1900-1993, and his work in the Northern Rio Grande area of New Mexico at the Library of Congress American Memories Web site: http:memory.loc.gov/ammem/rghtml/rghome.html This Web site presents The Juan B. Rael Collection, which documents the religious and secular music of Spanish-speaking residents of rural New Mexico and Southern Colorado. Using disc-recording equipment, Juan Rael in 1940 recorded himnos (hymns), folk dramas, wedding songs, and dance tunes.