Spirituality and mixed-blood identity: a comparative study of Miguel Angel Asturias and Leslie Marmon Silko

In this thesis I propose that the texts of Guatemalan author Miguel Angel Asturias and the North American Native author Leslie Marmon Silko can be compared and interpreted from the perspective of spirituality. I approach both mixed-blood authors as mediating a spiritually-centred contemporary identity. They revalue and update the spiritual teachings in the myths of their Meso-American-Anasazi ancestral heritages. A cross-cultural reading of mythical quests, indigenous sacred texts, Western mysticism, and the universal heroic paradigm discloses a universal recognition of the need to maintain order and balance between spirituality and materiality. An examination of contemporary Native and Latin American literary studies demonstrates that the dominant Western perspective creates a static view of indigenous people and a materialistic lifestyle which alienates individuals from the spirituality of their ancestors. I conclude that Asturias' and Silko's mediation of their multiple heritages provides a necessary re-valuing of Western and indigenous epistemologies. The mythical and sacred sources restore balance and unity in the individual and create a viable basis for contemporary mixed-blood and mixed-heritage identity.