Mothers Day History︱Holidays
By Kelly
We know Mother’s Day as a day to celebrate our mothers by treating them better than normal and giving them gifts. But do you really know the history or origin of it? Mother’s Day was originally cultural and initially not seen as an official holiday.
Forms of honoring mothers have existed for as long as, well, there have been mothers. Festivals honoring mothers in ancient times were often tied to deities or goddesses. Maternal symbols of fertility, birth, creativity, and growth cycles are visible throughout civilizations. The mother is the protector and nourisher of children and, by extension, of all humanity. The Phrygians held a festival for Cybele, the Great Mother of the Gods. The Greeks and Romans also honored the mother figure of their pantheons, Rhea and Cybele. During the Middle Ages, the custom evolved over time from allowing those who had moved away to visit their home and their mothers on Laetare Sunday (fourth Sunday of Lent in Christianity).
Even today, an important festival in India, Durga-puja, honors the goddess Durga. However, it became an official holiday in different countries during the twentieth century.
In Britain, it became Mothering Sunday which still stands today, although it’s often referred to as Mother’s Day. Anna Jarvis of Philadelphia was the American social activist who is generally recognized as the founder of the legal holiday known as Mother’s Day in the U.S. Jarvis’s mother had organized women’s groups to promote friendship and health. Jarvis held a memorial on May 12, 1907 for her late mother. Within five years virtually, every state was observing the day to commemorate mothers, and in 1914, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson had made it a national holiday.
Although Jarvis had promoted the wearing of a white carnation as a tribute to one’s mother, the custom developed of wearing a red or pink carnation to represent a living mother or a white carnation for a mother who was deceased. Over time, the day was expanded to include others, such as grandmothers and aunts, who played mothering roles even when they might have not had their own children but enjoyed the company of nieces and nephews. What had originally been a day of commemoration became associated with materialism as seen through the sending of cards and the giving of gifts, however. In protest against its commercialization, Jarvis spent the last years of her life trying to abolish the holiday she had brought into being.
Why do we celebrate Cinco De Mayo?
By Brandon
Cinco De Mayo is a holiday that is not a national holiday in Mexico but is still celebrated by Mexicans, and interestingly, by people in the United States. It celebrates a victory of the battle called the Batalla de Puebla. This battle was fought in Puebla, Mexico in May 5, 1862. The battle was fought by Mexico’s military, headed by the president, against the French forces sent by Napoleon III to create a satellite state in Mexico. A satellite state is a country that is independent but controlled by another country.
This confrontation was a good fifty years after the Mexican independence from Spain, commemorated on September 16th. One thing American people don’t know and need to know is that Cinco de Mayo (Fifth of May) is not about the independence of Mexico. Cinco de Mayo is celebrated more in the U.S. than in Mexico. For Mexicans, it marks the day that Mexico resisted and won against the French control, but there are other more important patriotic holidays. The holiday still hold the same definition in the US but some people do not know the real meaning. CInco de mayo is mostly celebrated in Puebla, Mexico because the war and holiday is from there. Because of some mexican immigrant this is one way to celebrate there mexican heritage. It become popular around 1960 during the civil right movement call Chicano Movement. There is no national holiday for Cinco de mayo in Mexico beside the independence and others.