VLVL/Blood & Vato, short-form

[snarf]

No cholos at all down here, Terrance. But you are right, it means indigenous
person, but only the ones from Perú, because that's how they call them in
their country. You don't call "cholo" a person of guaraní or mapuche origin.
Calling somebody a "cholo" still has racist connotations, unless you are one
of them. But there are not many Peruvians in Uruguay, maybe only a thousand.
Regarding the spanish pronounciation, I'm afraid that your understanding of
spanish through portuguese is leading you to funny mistakes. The
pronounciation of the vowels is completely different in spanish. Cholo,
should be pronounced choh-loh rather than chew-low.

For those who can actually read spanish, try
http://www.aymara.org/lista/archivo2001/msg00318.html

And, for those who think that everything is the same, and like to speak
about Borges through his wives' readings of Jorge Amado , you can
try "Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word", by Randall
Kennedy, Pantheon. 256 pp.


Date: Sun, 07 Sep 2003 10:34:17 -0400
From: Terrance <lycidas2 at earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: VLVL/Blood & Vato, short-form

charles albert wrote:
>
> Isn't cholo "fool"?

Sometimes. Sometimes it defines the use of language or even words like
"cholo."

In Portuguese it is pronounced chew-low. In the Mexican-American example
that S~Z provided it's a street word that refers to a home-boy,
gangster. Down where Maria comes from it probably means Indian or
indigenous person. Melville uses it in Moby-Dick (the Hark chapter ,
where it means a veteran of the sea. ;--)