The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 75, July 1971 - April, 1972 Page: 116

Southwestern Historical Quarterly

and precincts do not usually coincide, they can often be grouped to-
gether into relatively small areas that overlap. This provides an op-
portunity to relate an enormous amount of socioeconomic data to
electoral results. One can only hope that scholars in Texas will utilize
the Tarrance electoral material and undertake such analyses.
University of Houston RICHARD MURRAY
Los Chicanos, An Awakening People. By John Haddox. Illustrations
by Jos6 Cisneros. (El Paso: Texas Western Press, 1970. Pp. 44-
Notes, bibliography. $2.00.)
This short monograph consists in large part of numerous brief
quotes from various books and articles dealing with the Chicanos,
bound together by the author's narrative. His purpose, evidently, is
to present in the shortest possible form a sympathetic overview of the
Chicano movement and Mexican American traits, desires, and pros-
pects. The author does not pretend to offer any major new material.
Los Chicanos is handsomely printed and packaged, but then we have
come to expect that of any work touched by the talented hand of Carl
Hertzog. The monograph is obviously a token of the deep affection
Haddox has for Mexican Americans.
Brevity and the subjectivity born of love have inevitably led the
author to oversimplify and romanticize. Haddox naturally rejects the
negative stereotypes long attached to Chicanos, such as laziness, fatal-
ism, and lack of ambition. However, he offers in their place nothing
more than other more attractive stereotypes, claiming that Mexican
Americans love children, have concern for human dignity, possess
talent for artistic creation, are inclined to communalism, respect the
aged, and perceive leisure as a worthy activity. The Chicano emerges
in an all too angelic light, depicted in verbal hues unrecognizable to
students of human nature. Subjective, too, though understandable, is
Haddox's basic dislike of acculturation. He seems to forget that the
Mexican culture he champions was itself the product of an even
earlier cultural assimilation.
The arch-fiend "Anglo," tainted by the stain of productive capi-
talism, predictably takes his lumps from Haddox, dished out in the
form of retaliatory negative stereotypes. For example, according to
the author, "Anglos tend generally to want the newest, the most
modern of everything, with the past and tradition shunned.. .."
Such a statement suggests that Haddox, a Texan by residence, lacks

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