This graph shows my rating of the characters in Rain God and their levels of Cultural Schizophrenia. The two characters who I feel have the most Cultural Schizophrenic are Mama Chona and Miguel Grande. I placed them on 10 because they both refuse to acknowledge their Mexican Indigenous background, which inherently leads them to have historical amnesia to the atrocities the Spanish did to the Mexicas. Furthermore, because they refuse to accept their ancestry they are the epitome of internalized racism. Furthermore, both mother and son have an incredibly high amount of internalized sexism, misogyny, and adhere to patriarchy. Furthermore, I feel that both Mama Chona and Miguel Grande are fairly homophobic because Grande at least feels his brother Felix deserved to die via a hate crime.
I placed Miguel Chico as 9 because I felt that he rejected a lot of his father's patriarchy and sexism. I even feel that his story might allude to some kind of homoerotic background (especially he speaks about having his own secrets). However, I still left him very high up on the Cultural Schizophrenia because while I feel he renounced a lot of his Mexican culture to be free from it, and ultimately free himself of his schizophrenia, he decided to adopt American culture as his go to foundation. Well in this argument, I may be wrong then. Maybe he should be lower because he did reject a whole culture to adopt another one. But I will stand firm with my decision.
Juanita is 8 because she is very cultural schizophrenic, however, she does reject some of its symptoms. I do not feel she is very homophobic or sexist towards her son. Furthermore, she is not elitist and unrealistic about her situation as a Mexican woman like the Miguel's and Mama Chona. However, why I kept her so high is because she has this double standard for herself and her son in terms of her internalized sexism. When she finds Miguel Chico and Maria dressing up Mickey in a dress and dancing Juanita finds its totally ok for him to express himself like that. However, she allows for Miguel Grande to be a mujeriego, a cheat, and allows herself to be used by him. Although, I feel at the end she reached some kind of Mestiza or Border consciousness because she became empowered by his betrayal and did not allow him control.
I place Lola in 6 on the scale because I feel she is dealing with Cultural Schizophrenia when she is in the mess with Miguel Grande. She feels guilty for sleeping with a married man, more so her friends, and furthermore she is worried about what people are saying about. However, on the other hand she went out of her way and reclaimed her sexuality to get what she wanted. Therefore she is very much straddling both feminist ideals and Mexican patriarchy.
I put Angie and Felix on the same level of cultural schizophrenia because I feel that Felix and Angie were both very different from the main characters. Felix rejects a lot of notions patriarchy, and being a queer man he is very much a rejection of heteronormativity. Furthermore, Angie is very interesting because she has a lot of alternative, indigenous spiritual beliefs. She basically rejects the colonizers religion. But still has to deal with her patriarchy of Felix and what not.
JoEL, Nina, and Lena are on the lower end of the spectrum. JoEl was difficult to place and I feel that his going crazy, actually may put him up on the higher end of the spectrum because he straddles both cultures so much he went crazy. Nina is lower on the scale because she is is almost the antithesis of Juanita. She sees what Juanita doesn't and she doesn't stand for it, except only for the protection of her sister. Lena is the lowest on the scale because she is an empowered woman. She rejects American notions of identity as well as Mexican. She becomes a Chola, a blend of American and Mexican identities. Furthermore, she also reclaims her body and sexuality which can attribute to rejecting heteropatriarchal notions of womyhood. Furthermore, she still seeks vengeance because of the hate crime her father suffered; therefore, she is also not homophobic. Because of this she is the lowest on the Cultural Schizophrenia scale.
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