Mexican Lawlessness: Genocide and Massacre in Julián Herbert’s La casa del dolor ajeno

Rebecca Janzen

doi:10.5070/t483041152

Abstract

Author(s): Janzen, Rebecca | Abstract: This article examines Julian Herbert’s La casa del dolor ajeno: cronica de un pequeno genocidio en La Laguna (2015), which deals with a massacre of 300 Chinese people in Torreon, Mexico, in 1911. This cronica in novelized form weaves together the history of Chinese immigration to Mexico with contemporary violence and the author’s own experiences of research and writing. I bring Herbert’s imaginative interpretation of the past into conversation with the Mexican Constitution and penal codes that were in force during the massacre, and at the time Herbert was writing. I compare his treatment of the initial reports to late 19th and early 20th-century ideas of a right to life, work and citizenship and relate his 21st-century reflections to 20th century concepts of genocide. The article concludes that this weaving together of past and present exposes the violence of capitalism that preys on vulnerable people.

Highlights

Julián Herbert’s 2015 work La casa del dolor ajeno: crónica de un pequeño genocidio en La Laguna portrays a 1911 massacre of approximately 300 Chinese and Chinese-descendent people on the streets of Torreón, an industrial city in the state of Coahuila; the events around the massacre unfold throughout the La Laguna region, which spills over into the neighboring state of Durango
Herbert’s work states that ordinary people executed the massacre and blamed it on revolutionary conflict. He reaches this conclusion by conducting interviews and reading historical interpretations of the events from the early 21st century and by seeking out newspaper reports and archival material from the early 20th century
I argue that the massacre of Chinese people in Torreón was a consequence of systems that implicitly foster and condone violence and not an example of “lawlessness” in Mexico

Summary

UC Merced

TRANSMODERNITY: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World Title Mexican Lawlessness: Genocide and Massacre in Julián Herbert’s La casa del dolor ajeno Journal TRANSMODERNITY: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World, 8(3)

Conclusions

Works Cited