Martín Espada Essay

America is known for being a cultural melting pot, but how does American actually respond and relate to other cultures? This is a question that Spanish poet Martín Espada grapples with throughout his poetry. Three of Mr. Espada’s works, “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson,” “The new Bathroom Policy at English High School,” and “Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3 1877” all share the common theme of Americans attacking or censoring other cultures out of ignorance, fear, naïverty, and uncomfortableness.

The first poem mentioned, “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson,”  addresses how America treats other cultures by discussing assumptions American society makes about people of other cultures. One way Mr. Espada deals with these issues is by specifically discussing how Americans have stereotypical ideas of what a typical Spanish gangster would look like. To appear dangerous he would “put on dark eyeglasses, push my [Mr. Espada’s] beret at an angle, comb my beard to a point,” this helps to illustrate how Americans have this stereotypical idea of what someone of a certain culture should look like. In addition Mr. Espada continues to say that if he continued in his faux act of being a gangster, Americans would call in a “bilingual SWAT team to helicopter overhead begging me [Mr. Espada] to be reasonable.” By reading these lines of the poem we can infer that a bilingual SWAT team would be called in because there would be an assumption that Mr. Espada was Spanish and unable to understand English. We can see how Mr. Espada’s poem “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson,” confronts Americans behavior with other cultures.

The second poem mentioned “The new Bathroom Policy at English High School,” this poem mainly deals with censorship of and discomfort with other cultures. This is first seen in the lines “The only word he recognizes is his own name and this constipates him so he decides to ban Spanish from the bathrooms.” The American principal feels uncomfortable by the Spanish or the other culture so he censors it. In addition the line “Now he can relax” shows how once the other culture has been censored the principal now feels relaxed because he does not have to deal with anything that is foreign or uncomfortable to him. The poem “The new Bathroom Policy at English High School,” deals with many other issues around other cultures.

The third poem mentioned “Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3 1877” deals with American violence towards people from other cultures. Even the title “Two Mexicanos Lynched,” shows the theme of the poem which continues to reveal many sad stories about American violence towards people from other cultures who are not mainstream. In addition the lines “forty gringo vigilantes cheered the rope that snapped two Mexicanos into the grimacing sleep of broken necks,” shows another example of American violence towards people from another culture. The poem lists many examples of how Americans have brutally hurt those of other cultures. The poem “Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3 1877” shows another type of American hate towards other cultures, and in this poem through the lens of American violence.

This selection of three of Mr. Espada’s works when put together share the common theme of American cruelty towards people from other cultures that are not mainstream. Whether it be through violence or even cruelty by stereotyping people, or distrust of people from that culture, these works illustrate some American attitudes to and actions taken towards other people of cultures Indeed this problem occurs in America with exclusion acts and many other instances of discrimination. This issue of American alienation and hate stretches on to anyone who is different than what a mainstream American society knows. It is clear in issues surrounding the LGBTQ+ community and towards many marginalized groups.  Mr. Espada’s works challenge this behavior that occurs in American society and makes us wonder how do each of us unfairly respond to and treat people from different cultures from our own?