Mexican Legends - La Llorona, Yda Hillis Addis, Naranjal Mine, Tayopa (Paperback)

Chapters: La Llorona, Yda Hillis Addis, Naranjal Mine, Tayopa. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 20. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: '''La Llorona'' is Spanish for "The Crying Woman" and is a popular legend in Spanish-speaking cultures in the colonies of the Americas, with many versions extant. The basic story is that La Llorona was a beautiful woman who killed her children to be with the man that she loved and was subsequently rejected by him. He might have been the children's father who had left their mother for another woman. She drowned the children and then, after being rejected anyway, killed herself. She is doomed to wander, vainly searching for her children for all eternity. Her constant weeping is the reason for her name. In some cases, according to the tale, she will kidnap wandering children or children who misbehave. Typically, the legend serves as a cautionary tale on several levels. Parents will warn their children that bad behavior will cause her to steal them and being outside after dark will result in a visit from the spirit. The tale also warns teenage girls not to be enticed by status, wealth, material goods, or by men making declarations of love or any promises too good to be true. It also cautions them not to express their sexual desires. Some also believe that those who hear the wails of La Llorona are marked for death, similar to the Gaelic banshee legend. Additionally, the tale is a Mexican, Central and South American cultural symbol that models negative and despised feminine sexuality, where La Llorona is the archetypal evil woman condemned to eternally suffer and weep for violating her role as a wife and a mother. She is a failed woman because she has failed at motherhood. The tale serves to shape Mexican and Chicana women's conduct by prescribing an ideal...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=36564