Oscar Lewis (1) (1914–1970)

I just finished the prequel- "The Children of Sanchez". This, much shorter, work revisits the same family a few years on as three of the siblings (father and youngest daughter Marta are absent) reconvene as Aunt Guadeloupe dies, has a wake and is buried.
We recognize the personalities from Book 1- self-centred trader Manuel; bad boy Roberto, who still seems to have more of a heart than his brother- and aspirational Consuelo, a secretary who is raising Manuel's neglected offspring.
I felt the show more grinding poverty here, much more than in the prequel. There, the family had ups and downs; Aunt Guadeloupe, however, was an impoverished woman with an alcohol habit, living in a slum. The utter destitution, and lack of support is constant- if you cant scrape together the undertaker's fees, the body sits and putrefies; the church is on the make...As the book draws to a close, Manuel is calculating how to evict the Aunt's wastrel lover, while Consuelo advocates mercy.... show less

This is an anthropolgical study of an extended working class Mexican family in the 1950s. But if that sounds dull, I just want to say that it reads of a pretty gripping family saga; and as a work of psychology.
Father Sanchez has made something of himself through hard graft at the restaurant he works in, and a bit of enterprise. He seems exceptionally duty bound to his numerous children and grandchildren, forever helping them financially. And yet he is a flawed man- a womanizer, violent, show more harsh...
Lewis interviews each of his four children (by deceased first wife) three times. They take him through their lives, the events, the relationships...
Anthropologically, this introduces us to a very alien world. The machismo (wives expect to be beaten, kept short of funds); the lack of stability as marriage is a rare thing and people indulge in a succession of short lived affairs; the poverty; the corrupt police; the violence, drunkenness; the religion but, too, a bit of witchcraft... And what is it LIKE sharing one room with eighteen others- the ones you dislike,the ones with unsavory habits. the lack of privacy? The interviewees share their thoughts...

And then the story- one with no convenient tied-up ends as people lurch from one disaster to another. Infidelity, jail breaks, lottery wins..

But for me, it was predominantly a psychological masterpiece. Here we have four characters who know much of each others' lives. Yet the different slant on an event when relayed fronm two perspectives! Sanchez' disillusionment with the failures his children have turned out is set aside the traumatized Roberto- rejected, unloved, beaten as a child...and who (for perhaps that very reason) goes rather off the rails...

An absolute tour de force. show less

Normally, I would not have given a sociology book like this a second glance. But the village of Tepoztlan actually meant something to me. I had visited it for a day back in 1972 when I was studying Spanish in the nearby city of Cuernavaca. And I even have a rather lovely photo of a blind flautist playing on a small wooden flute on the steps of the church ....plus some othr photos of the village. Also, about a year or so later we spent a lovely day as guests of some British people who had a show more little "finca" in Tepoztlan with magnificent views of the surrounding mountains. So I was a bit curious to see what Oscar Lewis had found in his "re-survey of the village (which was carried out in the early 1940's. Interestingly, during WWII). An earlier sociological study had been carried out in 1926 by Robert Redfield. But the earlier survey was much more limited in scope and lacked the resources of the 1940's survey.
I must say that I was impressed with the thoroughness of the survey and with some of the self reflection. For example, the mere fact of having "El Doctor" in the village carrying out a survey changed the behaviour and responses of the people supposedly being observed. I was also curious about the Rorschach tests that were conducted: they seemed out of keeping with the rest of the survey. But then I realised that they were conducted by Oscar Lewis's wife who was a psychologist. I guess she wanted to take advantage of the situation she found herself in. But I found that section of the book rather unsatisfactory and when I took the trouble to consult a modern Psychology text book I found these comments on Rorschach tests: "the scientific evidence on projective measures is unimpressive (Garb, Florio, & Grove, 1998; Hunsley, Lee, & Wood, 2003). In a thorough review of the relevant research, Lilenfeld, Wood, and Garb (2000) conclude that projective tests tend to be plagued by inconsistent scoring, low relia-bility, inadequate test norms, cultural bias, and poor validity estimates. They also assert that, contrary to advocates' claims, projective tests are susceptible to some types of intentional deception (primarily, faking poor mental health). Based on their analysis, Lilenfeld and his colleagues argue that projective tests should be referred to as projective "techniques" or "instruments" rather than tests."
I was rather curious about how different Tepoztlan was in the early 1940's compared with when I visited in 1972. Really impossible to gauge but the poverty, unpaved roads, and apparent fusion of catholic religious traditions with native folklore seemed omni-present. My best links with the native indios population came via our "assistenta", Maria and It's interesting to note that in her case, she came from a poor village in Oaxaca and her daughter lived there and was effectively raised by the grandparents. But in two generations (the granddaughter) graduated from university so things had dramatically changed for this family.
I was especially interested in Lewis's conclusions that things in Tepoztlan were not quite as idyllic as had been painted by the earlier researcher. There were a lot more tensions and violence under the surface than Redfield had observed. And this would appear to be the continuing situation not something that had developed in the interim between surveys. This means to me that with sociological surveys like this that one needs to be very careful in drawing conclusions and making generalisations from a limited range of observations. People are clearly different; their environmental circumstances and life experiences are different and, especially in Tepoztlan, the historical issues;Toltec background, taken over by Aztecs, Later taken over by Spanish, Impact of Catholicism and Dominicans, Hacienda system, Mexican revolution, etc., are exceedingly complex. I noted the strange fusion of beliefs.... clearly dating back to the pre-hispanic gods with the Catholic beliefs ...especially the role of the devil. Obviously very difficult to completely erase such beliefs.
I was also mildly interested in their Appendix on "An intensive survey of Maize in Tepoztlan" because I did a Master's thesis on Maize and have always been interested in its origins in Mexico and the huge varieties of maize grown there. The main significant take-away for me with maize was the way in which individual regions or even families preserved particular strains of maize through generations. (Whereas the big breakthroughs in Maize cultivation came with hybrid maize and later (from Centro de Maize y Trigo...CIMMYT near Texcoco) with short varieties of maize.
Overall, a curious book, of historical significance because it is a detailed snapshot of a village in time. I'm not sure whether one can even reliably interpret changes between the earlier survey and this later survey because of the superficial nature of the earlier survey. But interesting to me. I give it four stars. show less

If any book can be considered timeless, 'A Death in the Sanchez Family' sadly deserves that honour. It is a study of poverty in the face of death, and through Lewis's keen eye for detail and extensive social research, the story becomes absorbing, even essential.