In reading Patricia Limerick’s article, “Adventures of the Frontier in the Twentieth Century,” one of the first things that is brought up is the many different uses and definitions of the word, ‘frontier’. Limerick tells readers that ‘frontier’ has been used in a commercial sense and also, and more obviously, in the historical sense. In the article Limerick looks at what the word used to mean and different meanings the word has that are relevant to today’s world. One of the first examples of the traditional meaning of the word is “the frontier as a place where white settlers entered a zone of “free” land and opportunity”. This is the way that Limerick describes in the beginning of the article when she is talking about Disney’s “Frontierland”. The second use of this word is of “la frontera”. Here it means that borderlands between Mexico and the United States. Of these two ways to use the word frontier, I feel that the term, la frontera is the meaning that we hear in news today.
After I finished reading this article, I realized that I was one of those people that only thought of the Wild West when I heard the word frontier. I also realized that when I heard this word I thought that it was very old fashioned in a sense and that it wasn’t used really to describe anything but the past in today’s society. I also was very narrow minded in that I only associated the word with American History and not any other country in the world until Limerick started talking about Turkey’s frontier. I also thought that Limerick pointed out a good point in referring to some of the problems that come from having a mindset on “Frontierland” when she talks about how important it is to draw the line between the fantasy of the frontier and the reality.
One last thing that I found interesting about Limerick’s work was that the word ‘pioneer’ is another word that has historical meanings and is used today in similar ways as the word ‘frontier’. Limerick points out that whenever the word ‘pioneer’ is used people will think about the pioneers in this country. She also does a good job pointing out how the word is used today giving a huge list of how it is used with the “Negro League Pioneers”. Limerick says that ‘pioneer’ is being used as a way of describing, “…dignity, courage, and determination in traveling where no black person had gone before…” It’s very ironic to me to see how two words that are associated with each other can have different meanings and ties to the past as well as being relevant to today’s society.
