Abstract
This thesis will look at Chicano culture through selected works of literature, film, and visual art. All three cultural artifacts share a common geographic space in southern California and were inspired by and created during the Chicano Movement of the 1960s and 1970s and exhibit facets of Chicana/o cultural identity, forging a new condition to inspire future societal change. Historian Deborah Cohen explains that the prefix “trans-” preceding “nationalism” signifies three distinct understandings: “trans-” as going beyond, which denaturalizes the nation-state as the definitive form of human organization; “trans-” as relational, formed in the in-between spaces; and “trans-” as change, as in the subject position formed and in play between nations and through crossing borders. Deborah Cohen’s unpacking of transnationalism is useful when analyzing interlocking vignettes of each Chicano work of art, namely a novel Their Dogs Came with Them by Helena Maria Viramontes, a documentary film Chicano Park and a mural painting Quetzalcoatl, as each can be interpreted as one of three ways of experiencing a transcultural Chicano identity. We embark on a journey through film, literature, and art to illuminate the Chicana/o experience in the United States through a multi-artistic approach.