Reclaiming Malintzin: Epideictic Practices of a Chicana Rhetoric

Abstract

This article analyzes the epideictic practices Chicana rhetors use to reclaim the figure of Malintzin, a woman cast as a promiscuous traitor for her role in the Spanish conquest. Since the figure of la Malinche was used to shame Chicana feminists as the traitors of the Chicano movement, Chicanas responded by first rejecting the narrative of la Malinche through rhetorical delinking, reframing her story with the use of amplification and depreciation, and finally reclaiming Malintzin as an aspirational symbol for Chicana feminists. Chicana epideictic makes a political argument about the value and worth of Chicana feminists by praising the Malintzin figure. Chicana epideictic challenges and celebrates community values and blurs the line between epideictic and deliberative rhetoric.

Notes

1 I would like to thank RR reviewers Jaime Armin Mejía and Brigitte Mussack for their thoughtful and thorough feedback. Their guidance was immensely helpful.

2 The works by del Castillo and Candelaria represent modern-day encomia to Malintzin since they focus heavily on her values and virtues. Gonzales and Sosa Riddell present an encomium to the Chicana and Alarcón falls somewhere in the middle.

3 The events leading to the Cholula massacre remain a contested point among historians because some believe Cortés lied to cover the fact that the attack was meant to cement his alliance with the Tlaxcalan people (Townsend 81-82).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Miriam L Fernandez

Miriam Fernandez is an Assistant Professor in the English Department at California State University, San Bernardino.