Leticia Neria PhD thesis - Research@StAndrews:FullText ...

‘nada de pulque ahorita compañeros porque luego ni se acuerdan de lo que hay que
gritar de la borrachera que traen’. The participants also receive new sombreros but the
organiser explains: ‘en vista de la espontánea colaboración demostrada cada uno de
ustedes va a recibir cinco pesos. El pulque después, cuando se acabe el acto y regresen
los sombreros’. 184
The practice known as ‘acarreo’ is illustrated in this scene. Acarreo refers to the
practice of requiring people to participate in official events by offering a payment or
threatening them with the loss of their jobs or benefits. 185 It was a well-known practice
during the PRI government. 186 Here, the broken frame of reference refers to the
contrasting image of people offering support and admiration though they have no real
interest in the person they are supposedly supporting. The ruse is obvious when the
organiser instructs a man to be clear about what the people should yell ‘porque luego se
ponen a gritar “Viva don Lázaro” y cosas así’. 187 A similar scene happens in another
celebration for Calzonzin, when a peasant yells ‘Viva Zapata’ and another one adds
‘Viva el que dijimos desden [sic] antes’. 188 During the parade we see a woman being
paid after she approaches Don Perpetuo to show her support and lets him carry and kiss
her baby.
The frame of reference that we could label ‘honest support’ is altered by this
reality, and we learn that the world is closer to the broken frame of reference than to the
‘correct’ one. Thus, these are acts of true humour: a social fault has been exposed and
denounced. Part of the comedy comes from the unexpected request to return the
184 Arau, Calzonzin Inspector, 1973.
185 The phenomenom is identified as Patrimonialismo by Favela Gavia and described as a mechanism in
which ‘los gobernantes dan privilegios a algunos grupos particulares a cambio de reconocimiento y
deferencia (…) El clásico acuerdo político requiere la subordinación oficial de los grupos sociales a la
tutela del partido a cambio de acceso a diferentes beneficios’ in Favela Gavia, Protesta y reforma… p. 9.
186 A famous event in which civil servants rejected this practice occurred during a ceremony in 1968
when they began shouting ‘¡no vamos, nos llevan!’ and ‘¡somos borregos!’ Carlos Monsiváis, Días de
Guardar (México: Ediciones Era, 1970), p. 265.
187 Arau, Calzonzin Inspector, 1973.
188 Ibid.
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