Noemi Martinez is a Chicana/Bori writer slash poet slash superhero sirena living in deep South Texas.

La Catrina High lady

 history, la catrina  No Responses »
Aug 302012
 

 

While he was alive, Posada received what amounted to just a few cents for each of his drawings. He lived a humble life and upon his death, was buried in a common grave, though there was nothing ordinary about him.

What I find most interesting about the use of La Catrina in popular culture is the juxtaposition of capitalism and the original intent of Jose Guadalupe Posada’s artwork.  With the catrina he poked fun at the high life of elegance, we all die, the rich, the important government official, the famous, the tortilla maker, the punk, the lovers, the dancers.  He satirized the current Porfirio Diaz regime of his time and became an icon of the Mexico Revolution and died dirt poor.  Arriba.
Emma Tenayuca Biography
1916-1999

“I was arrested a number of times. I never thought in terms of fear. I thought in terms of  justice.”

From South Texas, she  returned to San Antonio in her later years and became a school teache after she was forced out in the due to death threats because of her organizing.

The San Antonio pecan-shellers’ strike was a virtual uprising by the most downtrodden workers. It shook the city and the state and significantly empowered the the workers. Police threw 1,000 strikers, including Tenayuca, into jail, but they could not hold back the struggle. Tenayuca later said, “What started out as an organization for equal wages turned into a mass movement against starvation, for civil rights, for a minimum-wage law, and it changed the character of West Side San Antonio.” As the mass movement gained momentum, the “bosses” felt threaten and Emma Tenayuca begin receiving death threats. Via Voz de Aztlan

 Posted by at 9:32 pm

non-post on relationships

 animals, relationships  No Responses »
Aug 302012
 

Venomous snakes have venom glands and specialized teeth for the injection of venom. Members of the families Elapidae, Viperidae, Hydrophiidae, and Atractaspididae (and some from Colubridae, as well) are major venomous snakes.

Venomous snakes use modified saliva, snake venom, usually delivered through highly specialized teeth, such as hollow fangs, for the purpose of prey immobilization and self-defense. In contrast, nonvenomous species either constrict their prey, or overpower it with their jaws.

Venomous snakes include several families of snakes and do not form a single taxonomic group. This has been interpreted to mean venom in snakes originated more than once as the result of convergent evolution. Evidence has recently been presented for the Toxicofera hypothesis; however, venom was present (in small amounts) in the ancestors of all snakes (as well as several lizard families) as ‘toxic saliva’ and evolved to extremes in those snake families normally classified as venomous by parallel evolution. The Toxicofera hypothesis further implies that ‘nonvenomous’ snake lineages have either lost the ability to produce venom (but may still have lingering venom pseudogenes), or actually do produce venom in small quantities, likely sufficient to assist in small prey capture, but cause no harm to humans if bitten.

 Posted by at 7:44 am