"...And the Earth Did Not Devour Him"

After reading different informational articles about how the Hispanics had to work as laborers, I could not fully comprehend what their working conditions were like. After reading “…And the Earth Did Not Devour Him,” it made me sick to read how horribly the Hispanics were treated as migrant laborers. The short story followed a boy whose family worked in the fields as laborers. It starts out where the reader learns that his aunt and uncle died from heat-exhaustion from working for too many hours in the farm. Later his father starts getting the same symptoms as his aunt and uncle, and both of them died. The main character continuously asks himself and his mother why G-d is doing all of this to his family. The question “why?” is frequently asked in this short story because the main character feels that no one in his family has ever deserved to die. The main character and his mother talk about the death of their family members and the illness of their father. “Why? Why you? Why Dad? Why my uncle? Why my aunt? Why their kids? Tell me, Mother, why? Why us, burrowed in the dirt like animals with no hope for anything.” The main character is very frustrated at the fact that his people, the Hispanics are treated so poorly, and why all of these things had to happen to him. His father, aunt, and uncle are all decent people, who are hard working and do not deserve to die. A big theme of this story was the workers all knew about getting this sunstroke, however they were unable to do anything about it. “Us being so soaked with sweat, we didn’t feel so hot, but I guess that when you’re sunstruck it’s different. But I did tell him to sit down under the tree that’s at the edge of the rows, but he didn’t want to.” These workers were part of the lower class, and for them working was the only way to provide for their family, so they could not stop working or else their families would not be able to survive. Not only that but their working conditions were also very bad, and if they took breaks then their bosses would get very upset. “It don’t matter if the boss gets mad. Just don’t get sick.” The bosses did not care about the workers because if a worker was not working hard enough and they had to be fired, then they could easily be replaced because so many Hispanics were willing to work in America. After reading this story it makes me understand why Cesar Chavez know that he had to rebel against the organizations that were putting these Hispanics in the terrible working conditions that they were in. I will have to research more on how the working conditions are today for Hispanics. Because Hispanics are looking for a new opportunity in America, they will take jobs that are in terrible conditions, and will be treated very poorly.

Augenbraum, Harold and Margarite Fernandez Olmos. "...And the Earth Did not Devour Him."
The Latino Reader. Ed. Tomas Rivera. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1997. 290- 295. Print.