“Fraud Lies at the Heart of Nationalism” (Joshua Salyers)

Adding to Sarah’s discussion of Cuauhtémoc’s Bones: Forging National Identity in Modern Mexico, this week’s readings in conjunction with this book incited questions concerning the relationship between forged folk symbols and authenticity. The forgery of Cuauhtémoc’s tomb illustrated the formation of national identities at the local level. Legitimacy in the case of Cuauhtémoc’s tomb was primarily determined by villagers’ ardent promotion of a cultural artifact, regardless of its authenticity. This example demonstrated how the villager’s themselves acted as cultural power brokers. Shalom Staub likewise warned that public sector folklorists have often created the definitions of what was authentic that existed outside the communities they studied.

Gillingham argued that villagers in Ixcateopan, like many popular classes of Mexicans, recognized the economic and political utility of exploiting cultural artifacts. He noted that the growing value of prehispanic artifacts among European’s led to the systematic mass production of forged prehispanic relics. Authenticity for these everyday forgers was a malleable concept that rested on their legitimacy as the inheritors of Mexico’s indigenous past. As Paul Gillingham stated, “Fraud lies at the heart of nationalism: one man’s fraud is another man’s invention of tradition and a third man’s historia patria.”