For many people, the first thing they think when they hear ‘Día de los muertos’ is ‘Oh, it’s that holiday where Mexicans dress up as skeletons and make fun of talking about their dead loved ones.’ But it is much more than that, and preconceived notions are often wrong. It even has an American counterpart that no one seems to talk about called All Souls Day. So let’s find out together what El Día de los Muertos really is and what it’s all about.
The Day of the Dead or known in English as the Day of the Dead is a festival that is celebrated from October 31 to November 2. It is celebrated throughout Latin American culture, but is strongly associated with the Mexican culture from which it is based. (Garrett, and Soriano) . Its origins come from the ancient Aztecs about 3,000 years ago. According to Infoplease .com, we can look at their calendar and see the names of the 2 days that were celebrated and can be translated to ‘Feast of the Little Dead’ and ‘Feast of the Adult Dead’. However, it seems that over the years, the two have combined into one big three-day festival celebrating lost loved ones. In the 1500s, a group of Spanish conquistadors led by Cortés conquered the Aztec Empire and completely took over that area, which we know today as Mexico. When they conquered them, they began to try to incorporate their religious beliefs, Catholicism, into the natives. They did this by incorporating holidays such as All Saints’ Day and All Saints’ Day into their celebrations. (Ross). Although, the natives took this as an opportunity to try and incorporate their own traditions and ways of celebrating the dead. So over the years we’ve ended up with this combination of what we now know as El Día de los Muertos. It falls on November 1 and 2, which happens to be All Saints’ Day and All Saints’ Day on the Catholic calendar. (November 2nd – the Day of the Dead, All Soul’s Day)
It is basically a three-day festival that celebrates the lives of loved ones who have passed away or passed away. Mourning their lives and being sad that they were gone was thought to be an insult, so this festival celebrates their lives with food, parties, and other things that the dead loved or enjoyed while they were still alive. (Garrett, and Soriano).
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They do many things throughout the three days of celebration. Just to name a few, they dress up as dead people and go to the graves of their loved ones and dance around their graves. Children also make decadent sugar skulls and eat them. They create alterations/shrines in your home with the favorite things of your loved ones. Sometimes they even throw big elaborate parties to celebrate their lost loved ones and this is done in memory and to honor those who are gone from this earth.
Next to Halloween, this has to be one of my favorite holidays in this world we live in. This is due to the respect and honor that this holiday represents. I think it’s really cool that it’s not just a normal holiday where people dress up, but it’s a holiday where you celebrate the lives of those you’ve lost instead of mourning them. I think that many times we spend our lives mourning our situation and the situations of others that we can love. So that’s what makes these holidays really unique and a great party is that it does the opposite of that. In turn he decides to celebrate life and everything that was good about it. So now you know a little more about what these holidays really are.
It truly is a fantastic holiday and if you haven’t seen what it’s all about I suggest looking again and you’ll be amazed at what you find.
