By Martha I. Chew Sánchez. 2006. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. 230 pages. ISBN: 0-8263-3478-4 (hard cover).

[Review length: 1049 words • Review posted on December 12, 2007]

Martha I. Chew Sánchez’ book, Corridos in Migrant Memory, provides us with a brilliant, in-depth analysis of contemporary --mainly 1990-2003-- Mexican-immigration-themed corridos or Mexican ballads. Her insider status, as a woman who grew up listening to corridos within the confines of her family, relatives, and friends in the New Mexican and Chihuahua geographic areas, allowed her to enter the world of the corrido and explore its multiple perspectives and multidimensionality. Thus her work encompasses ethnographic interviews with composers, performers, and audiences of corridos, literary analysis, and fieldwork both in the United States and Mexico.