A commonality in Thomas Rivera’s And the Earth Did Not Devour Him and Richard Rodriguez’s Aria is the theme of inclusion. Both stories take a look at Mexican American children’s experiences in school and the adversity they face in a predominately Caucasian school system.
In Rivera’s semi-autobiographical novel, the narrator (Rivera) tells how he is treated differently simply because he is of Mexican heritage. When he is just starting school young Rivera is forced to be checked for lice and the teachers and children judge the boy just for being Mexican. “Everybody just stares at you up and down. And then they make fun of you and the teacher with her popsicle stick, poking your head for lice. It’s embarrassing. And then they turn up their noses.” Rivera is treated as a zoo animal, being checked for lice to deem him fit for their presence. He is never treated as an equal to the other children and the teachers assume Rivera is unclean and dirty just because he is Mexican. He talks about how he is pulled aside and made to undress completely for the school nurses so they could check his body for lice and perhaps diseases. Not only did the adults treat Rivera as a second class citizen, but so did the Caucasian children. “I don’t like Mexicans because they steal. You hear me?” Mexicans were perceived in a negative light and the assumptions were passed on to the children. Rivera is picked on and treated badly because the children were told that all Mexicans were degenerates. They accepted this claim at face value rather than getting to know Rivera for who he actually is as a human.
In Rodriguez’s story Aria, he shares his personal experiences in a school of the rich upper class white children. He does not speak of being bullied or ridiculed by his teachers, rather Rodriguez explains that he felt disconnected with the English based society of the gringos and was afraid to make English his dominant language. “But I couldn’t believe that the English language was mine to use. (In part, I did not want to believe it.)… Silent, waiting for the bell to sound, I remained dazed, diffident, afraid.” Richard does not feel he is the same as the other children, he is different. His home life is filled with Spanish words and his own culture while in school everything is new. He is unsure about this new word and at the end of the day he wishes only to retreat back home where everything makes sense. Schooling for Rodriguez is strange and new because he does not come from the background of the other students. He is disconnected from the school mostly because the language and atmosphere are so different from his own personal experiences at home. “At last, seven years old, I came to believe what had been technically true since my birth: I was an American citizen.” Through attending a Caucasian school Rodriguez is about to connect and immerse himself into American culture. He no longer identifies himself with being Mexican, but has found a place for himself in the American society.
In both stories the young boys have problems immersing themselves in the gringo society. Rivera is forced to be separated from the white children simply because of how Mexicans are viewed. He is not allowed a chance to be anything other than another lice ridden Mexican. Rodriguez felt too different from the gringos to fully accept their society as a child. He did not feel as if he belonged in a predominately white society and shied away from including himself. In both cases the boys’ culture has an impact on how well they can fit into the Caucasian society. Would the inclusion process have been different if the ratio of white to Mexican children had been 50/50? Were they boys’ lack of inclusion because they were severely outnumbered by the white children?
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