The Festival de Rock y Ruedas in Avándaro, 1971

Abstract

The Festival de Rock y Ruedas took place in Avándaro, in the suburbs of Valle de Bravo, a small town in Estado de México, on September 11 and 12, 1971. Among the organizers were transnational corporations such as Coca-Cola and the national mass media monopoly Telesistema Mexicano. Avándaro was the culmination of the process of creating a youth culture of consumption that started in the early 1960s and went through several transformations during the next decade. As part of the project to commercialize youth culture, the mass media tried to impose stereotypes that were reappropriated and resignified by groups of young people, such as “onderos.” Their actions became an obstacle for corporate business plans and turned Avándaro into one of the milestones of the Mexican countercultural movement in the second half of the 20th century.