Between the Borderlands and The Last Generation: An Autoethnographic and Theoretical Analysis of Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza by Gloria Anzaldua and The Last Generation: Prose and Poetry by Cherrie Moraga

Between the Borderlands and The Last Generation is an autoethnographic and theoretical analysis of two Chicana Feminist’s autoethnographic texts: Borderlands/La Frontera by Gloria Anzaldua and The Last Generation by Cherrie Moraga. The Chicano Movement of the 1960s and 70s was plagued by homophobic and machismo norms that are still prevalent in the Chicanx community that I am a part of today. This thesis explores Anzaldua and Moraga’s different responses to those norms by focusing on the ways they sought to reclaim and reform the Aztlán homeland; their reclamation of our creation story; and the various ways they discuss generational, mental, and physical violence; their discussion of bodies and notions of monstrosity and shame; and sex and eating as tools of healing. I use these themes to inform the creation of my own multi-modal autoethnography, which takes the form of poetry and storytelling, in order to engage in the tradition of non-normative writing that Chicana Feminist Literature has embraced. This thesis uses the theories of Chicana Feminist Theory, Queer Theory, and Decolonial Theory to engage with and put my own experience and activism into conversation with Anzaldua’s and Moraga’s and to highlight and dismantle the machismo and homophobic norms of the past and present