Born in 1937 in New Mexico, Rudolfo Alfonso Anaya grew up during World War II. As a Chicano living in the Southwest, he was affected by a variety of familial and societal influences, including his Mexican, Spanish, and Indian ethnic heritage, Anglo-American social conventions, Catholic and pagan religious ideologies, racism and the Chicano rights movement, and the ongoing war and violence. In Bless Me, Ultima Anaya describes what it was like to come of age during this era.
The multiethnic Southwest-a brief background. Ancient Mexico was inhabited by Aztec, Maya, Toltec, and other indigenous Indian peoples. In 1519 the Spanish conquistadores (conquerors) invaded mainland Mexico and conquered the Aztecs, the ruling group in Mexico, who were led by Moctezuma II at the time. The conquistadores killed Moctezuma and within two years gained control of the Mexican empire, imposing their language as well as their political and religious beliefs upon the Indian peoples. Catholic missionaries arrived in droves and began converting the Indians to Catholicism by any and all means, including force. Not having brought any Spanish women with them, the conquistadores took Indian women as wives and mistresses.
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