Voices of migrant children in Chillán

Abstract

In the book Voces de infancia migrante en Chillán. Relatos de mitos y leyendas sin fronteras by María Loreto Mora Olate, she collected Latin American oral stories incorporating students from Venezuela, Haiti, Peru and Colombia, among others, who live in the city of Chillán, in southern Chile, where the presence of foreign population has increased in recent times (SERNAMIG-INE-UNICEF, 2023).
It is known that certain legends are part of the popular imagination and Latin American folklore. For example, the legend of La Llorona, beyond the different versions and particularities that swarm in every corner of the Creole region, in general, alludes to the ghost of a woman with long hair, dressed in white, who cries because she has lost - or killed, depending on the adaptation of the moment - her son. Oral culture is notable for the diversity of versions that revolve around the same event or, as in this case, the same legend, which, as it passes from mouth to mouth, like the game of telephone, mutates but manages to remain faithful to its original meaning. Thus, El Silbón from Venezuela is a myth loaded with symbolism: a spoiled child disembowels his father in order to eat, however, he is punished with blows or lashes incited with chili, salt, lemon or pepper, depending on the variation, and condemned to wander eternally with his father's bones; in other versions, she kills womanizing men. A similar situation occurs with the legend of María Lionza, a pagan deity who protects the mountains and plains of the oil country.