The Street Vendors & Unique Soundscapes of Mexico.
Reports from Other Continents
Street vendors are often referred to as merchandisers who use public spaces to sell their products and services. In Mexico, street vendors go back to the pre-Hispanic times, when people started selling things around the “Tianquiztli,” which means "Aztec society market” in Náhuatl (Aztec language). Throughout Mexico and Latin America, street vendors have developed trademark ways of telling what they sell, from homemade jingles to improvisation. These “chants” are usually sung with their mere voices, and in other cases, they use sound artifacts (instruments) to create Mexico´s soundscape through and through. Since childhood, Mexicans associate specific street chants with the city's own soundtrack. These sounds are found in everyday life, in the subway, the bus, public plazas, the Alameda, and markets. These street singers have built a craft that is passed on through generations, and some of their “jingles” have evolved through time. Here lies music's magic as a universal language that manages to communicate people with each other.
A film by Hugo Hernández
Mexico, 2020
