Week 8

In part of chapter 4 in Mark Cameron Edberg's book, he compares the narcotrafficker persona to the urban dealer persona in the U.S. Edberg points to a few things: the two personae share an emphasis on "performance, on establishing a reputation and carrying out a daily performance that validates the performer" (116); both simultaneously "contest and accept dominant group meanings with respect to the criteria for establishing oneself as a 'significant' or admire person" (117); and for both personae, "death is not the ending but the 'launching' of an individual into a timeless existence as an iteration of the persona whose life will float in the popular imaginary" (117).

What Edberg doesn't address what I feel is another important parallel. Just as the narcotrafficker persona is made famous through narcocorridos, the urban dealer persona receives a good bit of attention in modern U.S. rap and hip-hop music. One specific example came to mind when I read the following sentence in Edberg's book: "Sell narcocorridos, make money, be powerful — no matter what your humble roots" (109). This reminded me of Kanye West, an artist many dub a "poser" because he purportedly grew up outside of the world he sings about so frequently. Although he has little to no lived experience in the urban dealer environment, he releases songs like "We Don't Care," with lyrics about "drug dealing just to get by." And then? He sells them. For lots of money.

Kanye West is HUGE, and it's because he sings about what everybody wants to hear — the thug life — although he never lived it. Then it got me thinking: In what other ways does U.S. pop culture in general (or in specific) follow the narcocorrido model of creating what sells? Isn't it true that this idea is necessarily part of every piece of mainstream pop cultural art — artists see what their audiences find appealing, then present it to them? In what way do modern narcocorridos differ from this?

Edberg also writes that "corridos are often tales of how someone died, as a way of saying who they were..." (113). He further says that Icelanders were obsessed with honor, esteem and reputation and that Mexicans are said to share that characteristic. Often with people in Mexico (especially narcotraffickers), their honor, esteem and reputation were revealed by and commemorated after death. This made me think back to Margolles' work (jury's still out on whether it's called "art") with the dead bodies. In the "self-portraits" where she's holding or standing next to the bodies in the morgue, is that Margolles' way of saying, "Where are the corridos for these people? Who's singing about how this man died?"

My question back to Margolles would be: What do their lives mean if their death is disrespected by some lady taking gross pictures with them? OR is that the point? Does taking the pictures and displaying them to the public commemorate these people's lives in a way which they wouldn't otherwise receive? If so, why does Margolles strive to do this? How do corridos differ from this and other ways of commemorating a life (or a death)?