The Mexican-American/ Chicano writer Miguel Méndez was born in Bisbee, Arizona, a small town on the United States–Mexico border, to a family with strong Mexican and indigenous (Yaqui) roots. His father worked in mining and agriculture and passed on to Méndez his love of the Mexican(-American) oral storytelling tradition. His mother, for her part, passed on to him her love of reading. When Méndez was only six months old, his family were sent back to Mexico as part of the mass deportation of ‘Mexicans', both legally and illegally resident in the USA, during the Great Depression. Méndez attended primary school in Mexico and subsequently left school to work as labourer in both agriculture and the construction industry in the southern United States, finally settling in Tucson, Arizona,…

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Citation: Pitman, Thea. "Miguel Méndez". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 05 July 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=12217, accessed 19 March 2024.]

12217 Miguel Méndez 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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