Vanished Voices Lecture Series presents "Accidentality and Mexistentialism," with Carlos Sánchez.

Central to Aztec/Nahuatl teaching is the reminder that “the Earth is slippery." This reminder means to convey the notion that regardless of how stable you think you are, your stability depends on the earth itself – the earth on which you stand and which hurls aimlessly about the universe. If the earth is slick, slippery, shaky and slipping about the darkness of space, then everything about you, including everything you know, rests on an insecure foundation. The Aztecs insist that if the Earth can fall from its orbit, so can you. This idea of an irremediable precariousness makes its way into Mexican existentialism, or Mexistentialism, 400 years later. Emilio Uranga calls it "accidentality."

This talk is primarily about accidentality and what it means for Uranga – how he thinks it defines the Mexican existential condition. In a secondary sense, the talk is also about existentialism and Mexistentialism, how they're the same and how they are different.