José Vasconcelos’s Neoplatonist Politics of Music: Theory and Praxis

The mystical aura surrounding José Vasconcelos’s theory of mestizaje is derived from Neoplatonist philosophy, with God replacing Plotinus’s One. In the Neoplatonic cosmos of the cosmic race, music’s special connection with the divinity was to be instrumental in redeeming “enlightened” mestizos and Indigenous people. Thus, they would assume the historical role of becoming the Hispanic-based, mixed-race, universal culture that was destined to counteract neocolonial power. Vasconcelos’s political, nationalist, and educational projects turned this philosophy into praxis, as the mystical power of Beethoven’s symphonies and the already-emblematic canción mexicana, collectively articulated as Mexican, reached massive audiences in cathartic performances by thousands of children and workers.