Explore Indigenous Textiles by State

Use the drop down box to enter each state and regional indigenous group

 
Web www.mexicantextiles.com

Proof of the vanishing textile tradition

The purpose of the Mexican Indigenous Textile Project is the preservation of the textile memory of Mexico. In the past three month I have been finding more and more villages with only one person that continues to wear traditional indigenous costume. In the Tehuacan Valley there were at least two villages and in the Otomi region of Tenango de Doria another three village. Further down the road in the Tepehua regions only 80 women are know to wear their traditional costume.
Embroidery and weaving is has a very long tradition in Mexico and in many cases where traditional costume has disappeared the women continue to embroider and sell traditional looking blouses and skirts. I cant help but feel a sense of urgency in the documentation of these peoples. Below are some links where the costumes are either worn by one person or extinct:

Nahua of Buena Vista, Zaoquiapan
}Nahua of San Geronimo
Totonaca of Pantepec , now extinct
Otomi of El Grande
Otomi of El Ejido
Nahua of Xalitla Guerrero

These are just a few examples of the situation all

over Mexico.

Textile patterns Sta. Anna Tzacuala, Hidalgo
Textile Patterns Mextla Baja , Puebla
About this web site

Mexican textiles have existed for more than 5000 years, but now in many villages traditional embroidered blouses (huipils) are worn only by the grandmothers. Mexico's indigenous textile culture is in danger of extinction. The embroidery on blouses and huipils is particular to specific towns and ethnic groups. This site identifies the groups and villages that various textiles come from. I make frequent trips to traditional villages to document the current state of their textile traditions and I present them here in the format of a virtual museum. Explore these groups and villages with me and enjoy!
Click the on the picture below to enter the indigenous world of Mexico. These are all the villages that are currently documented. Just pick any one to start the adventure. The creation of a virtual museum is made possible by the graphic nature of the internet; this is a museum, a reference guide, and an ever-expanding book. It is my single-minded purpose to present this information for educational, historical and cultural study.

I am dedicated to continually bringing the user new and clearly-documented indigenous textiles from the villages of Mexico. Endangered Mexican cultures are presented through their textiles, be it embroidered blouses, huipils, quechquemitls, ponchos, backstrap woven belts, or wrap skirts. It is the intent of this work to bring to light the more than 10,000,000 indigenous peoples of Mexico that have for so long been forgotten and taken for granted. Many of these peoples have fled village poverty for big city jobs or to migrate to the US, but many of them also remain in their home villages. We still know very little about them.

Textile fashion is not static in the villages; styles change and, just as for women everywhere, the way you look is important. In some regions of Mexico the style of dress remains within the indigenous form. However, in many others, the old styles are co-opted by modernism and the young do not want to be seen as "indios." They refuse to wear the wonderful embroidered or woven garments, and instead put on tee shirts and jeans. Circumstances can vary in so many ways: there are towns where the traditional dress is made only for sale to tourists, towns where the traditional textiles are only used during festivals, others where they are almost mandatory, and others where the young adopt modern dress while the grandmothers continue to wear traditional dress. The indigenous groups that are included in the study are listed below.

Why are textiles disappearing

Around the world indigenous cultures are under pressure from the forces of modernization and globalization. In Mexico, years of government neglect and a persistent racism have created an economic desperation which has forced generations of men and women to flee the poverty of their communities. These indigenous people immigrate to the big cities of Mexico and the USA. Traditional dress marks them as indigenous, and in a society where being an “indian” puts you at the bottom of the social ladder, that is not good. So for decades, as people leave the communities, they leave behind their ancestral knowledge of how to weave, embroidered and the social identity that the Mexican indigenous textiles and language provide.

This project began based on a textile collection of over 400 pieces and has as its purpose the identification of Mexican indigenous textiles and costume. Each village or region has distinctive clothing, both embroidered and woven. The documentation of these textiles includes pictures of the communities, women and men wearing traditional clothing, examples of the different textile patterns from the specific village and example from the collection.

This project has gone beyond the documentation of the collection and now has over 225 villages documented. The Mexican Indigenous Textile project is presented as an on line museum which provides graphic evidence of the locations and type of traditional clothing worn in the villages, in addition in many cases an we make an evaluation of the extent of the extinction. As you browse the website you will notice a great number of grandmothers, in many communities they are the last.

It is not only indigenous dress that is under pressure but all sorts of other customs which provide the rich cultural base that is formed by Mexicos over 60 ethnic groups. Pottery, woven palm and other grasses, medical healing and shamanistic practices, that have serves these communities for thousands of years are rapidly passing into extinction. In some of the northern Mexican groups on three of four people still speak the indigenous language.

There are many areas of Mexico where traditional cultures are still strong, however they are more and more like islands rather than regions.