Emigration: some Mexican views

I write a lot about immigration into the United States on this blog. I am very aware of and sympathetic toward the millions of people who are driven by economic desperation to cross the border from Mexico into the United States to find work. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has decimated traditional Mexican agriculture, flooding the country with U.S. crops; big corporations' search for ever cheaper labor has sent factory jobs to China and Central America. So hungry men leave in search of work to feed the women and children left behind.

In Mexico City's Museo Nacional de Antropologia, a large area is devoted to showing how various subgroups of the Mexican population have preserved their customs and way of life. The focus is on those of predominantly indigenous descent.

Many of these displays end with a note about the effects of ongoing, increasing, out-migration. Here's most of one:

The [Purepecha] Family
The family is the basic unit for the organization of the social relationships in each domestic group, extended family, district, town, region, and even among those who have emigrated.

... Purepecha is reproduced and renewed when the family builds a house, works the land, manufactures goods, prepares traditional food, educates small children, marries, worships the dead, holds religious positions, and in general, keeps alive "the custom" and "the belief" that rule the thought and behavior of the Purepecha people.

It is the responsibility of the organized groups of families to keep traditions alive. The principles underlying their organization can [must] overcome such trials as the separation of the family due to the absence of some of its members or the lack of interest of many young people in participating in the system of the positions. [The Museum's English with my interpolation and emphasis.]

And here is yet another such anthropological description of social havoc.

The Family in the Pueblos
The nuclear family or domestic group is the center of social organization in the pueblos, traditional communities. Its unity and cohesion are essential to survival and cooperation in the community. ...

Generally, the family is the unit of production and consumption. Within the group, each member has a particular standing and job in accordance with age and sex. ...

Traditional rituals reinforce the links between families when needed to meet the many challenges to the life of the community as well as proscribing roles in various civic and religious duties.

These arrangements have been strained by constant emigration and abandonment of the community by some men and even complete nuclear families. [My very free translation and my emphasis.]

What looks to some in the United States like an invasion looks to many in Mexico like the death of ancient ways of life.