Searching for Madre Matiana

Prophecy and Popular Culture in Modern Mexico

Edward Wright-Ríos author Kris Lane editor

Format:Paperback

Publisher:University of New Mexico Press

Published:30th Dec '14

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Searching for Madre Matiana cover

In the mid-nineteenth century prophetic visions attributed to a woman named Madre Matiana roiled Mexican society. Pamphlets of the time proclaimed that decades earlier a humble laywoman foresaw the nation’s calamitous destiny - foreign invasion, widespread misery, and chronic civil strife. The revelations, however, pinpointed the cause of Mexico’s struggles: God was punishing the nation for embracing blasphemous secularism. Responses ranged from pious alarm to incredulous scorn. Although most likely a fiction cooked up amid the era’s culture wars, Madre Matiana’s persona nevertheless endured. In fact, her predictions remained influential well into the twentieth century as society debated the nature of popular culture, the crux of modern nationhood, and the role of women, especially religious women. Here Edward Wright-Rios examines this much-maligned - and sometimes celebrated - character and her position in the development of a nation.

ISBN: 9780826346599

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

392 pages