Latin American Literature Commons^™

Decolonizing French: Afrophonics In Ken Bugul’S Aller Et Retour (2013), Hapsatou Wane

The Coastal Review: An Online Peer-reviewed Journal

This article explores the innovative language strategies employed by Senegalese writer Ken Bugul in her novel Aller et retour to construct a dynamic and interconnected linguistic landscape that challenges fixed language boundaries. Ken Bugul's "langue fabriquée" combines elements of French, Wolof, and English, reflecting a transglocal dimension that embodies the essence of afrophonics—a poetics of resistance that empowers local cultures in a globalized context. Through a detailed analysis of Ken Bugul's linguistic choices, including the use of quotation marks, footnotes, and arbitrary transcription, the study reveals how she creates a language that defies categorization and decolonizes French without resorting to …

Ships In Houston, Nadia Villafuerte, Julie Ann Ward

Undiscovered Americas

Ships in Houston by Nadia Villafuerte, translated by Julie Ann Ward, is a harrowing and heartrending collection of fifteen stories that bring to life characters who, though they exist independently from one another, inhabit the same world: Mexico’s southern border. Using acute attention to language, such as various dialects and slang, to create a nuanced and varied mood and setting, Villafuerte’s stories track exotic dancers, sex workers, truck drivers, drug dealers, immigration officials, and even a mayor’s daughter to create compelling fictions rooted in the harsh realities of borderlands that many choose to overlook. While the US’s southern border with …

Ejercicios De Sí: Escritura, Cuerpo Y Deporte En El Cono Sur (1964–2019), Pablo Yankelevich

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My dissertation studies the work of three performative figures from Latin America for whom physical practice is a fundamental issue of their artistic inquiries. In particular, it analyzes the ways in which writers and athletes Leonor Silvestri (Argentina), Héctor Benjamín Viel Temperley (Argentina), and Paulo Leminski (Brazil) problematize the body as the site of social and political experimentation over the last fifty years. By examining how these figures challenged liberal and neoliberal normative dictums about the place of the body, particularly in times of political repression, my research reflects on unauthorized exercises of bodily freedom and considers sport and physical …

Resistance Narratives: Storytelling Of Transnational Insurgencies In 1960-70s Us And Mexico, Tania Libertad Balderas

English Language and Literature ETDs

Resistance Narratives: Storytelling of Transnational Insurgencies in 1960-70s US and Mexico emphasizes how the narratives from the Mexican Insurgency, the American Indian Movement (AIM), and the leftist faction of the Chicana/o Movement in the 1960s and 1970s articulate intersecting notions of resistance, liberation, and transnational solidarity. The comparative analysis of the testimonial novel Las mujeres del alba (2019) by Chihuahuan novelist Carlos Montemayor, the autobiographies Lakota Woman (1991) and Ohitika Woman (1993) by Sičháŋǧu Lakȟóta writer and AIM militant Mary Brave Bird (formerly Crow Dog), and the memoirs and plays by the San Diego-based group Teatro de las Chicanas, collected …

Insatisfacción Y Tácticas De Oposición: Tres Novelas De Formación Femenina En América Latina (1870-1940), Andrea Angel Baquero

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Esta tesis estudia las novelas de formación femenina como un subgénero novelístico que se distancia del Bildungsroman en la noción de aprendizaje e integración social de las protagonistas. El auge de las novelas de formación femenina en América Latina transcurrió de forma conjunta con el posicionamiento de la mujer como escritora y la conquista de sus derechos políticos y civiles. Por lo cual, este trabajo parte de la hipótesis de que el surgimiento y posterior auge de las novelas de formación se dio de manera conjunta con la profesionalización de la labor escritural de las mujeres por una relación de …

Archivo Y Memoria: Una Mirada A Tres Historias De Mujeres Esclavizadas En El Virreinato De La Nueva Granada De Finales Del Siglo Xviii, Luisa Carolina Julio Gomez

Department of Modern Languages and Literatures: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Colonial documents preserve information that allows us to know the local Andean history of the Viceroyalty of New Granada. These manuscripts reveal forms of violence that shaped the subjectivities of the time and the resistance of oppressed women. This dissertation examines the effects of slavery and the response of three enslaved women to that colonial violence. This analysis seeks to better understand and make visible how the intersection between racism and patriarchy impacted the lives of three racialized women in the colonial context.

This dissertation focuses on the experiences, struggles, and resistance of three women present in the manuscripts consigned …

Commemorative Palimpsests In Post-Authoritarian Argentina: The Case Of Esma, Emily R. Nelsen

Vernacular: New Connections in Language, Literature, & Culture

The authoritarian military regime in Argentina (1976-1983) left lasting impacts on the country’s social, political, and economic way of life. Characterized by thousands of violations of human rights, this period in history is still felt in Argentine society as activists and families search for truth. Simultaneously, other actors prefer to deny responsibility and argue for the need to move on, thus renouncing the legacy of state terror. ESMA, a notorious former clandestine torture center in Buenos Aires, became a site of memory on March 24, 2004, a date that also came to symbolize the anniversary of the coup d’état. Using …

Argentine Women’S Narratives Of Leadership, Ileana Andrea Mocciola

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The present study investigated and examined the narratives of Argentine women leaders while obtaining and exercising leadership positions. This research was based on narrative theory and the feminist standpoint theory. Argentine female participants (N = 10) were subject to interviews that overall lasted 600 minutes and were conducted through the Zoom platform. Fifty-five pages of single-spaced transcripts were analyzed and studied. The results of this study revealed that Argentine women face major challenges when it comes to tokenism, exclusion, mentorship, and stereotypes that prevent and limit them from reaching and succeeding in leadership positions.

Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado, Editor. Mexican Literature As World Literature. Bloomsbury Academic, 2022., Caroline E. Tracey

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado, editor. Mexican Literature as World Literature. Bloomsbury Academic, 2022. 266 pp.

A Brief Look At The State Of Central American Science Fiction Studies, Greg C. Severyn

Alambique. Revista académica de ciencia ficción y fantasía / Jornal acadêmico de ficção científica e fantasía

This contribution serves simultaneously as a broad overview of the current state of Central American science fiction studies as well as the introduction to the special issue of Alambique on the same topic. The article begins by briefly examining the literary history of the genre in the region, as well as its parallel development with other, more canonical genres. However, the main focus is on the work that still needs attention in the field of Central American science fiction studies, including a more precise conceptualization of the genre, a deeper consideration of the genre’s aesthetic and critical tendencies, and the …

Humanismo, Empatía Y Un Dios Terrenal: Un Análisis De La Ilustre Familia Androide De Álvaro Menen Desleal, Oscar García

Alambique. Revista académica de ciencia ficción y fantasía / Jornal acadêmico de ficção científica e fantasía

Entre los textos que componen la colección La ilustre familia androide (1972), del escritor salvadoreño Álvaro Menen Desleal (1931-2000), hay doce cuentos que pueden considerarse como ciencia ficción. En este trabajo se lleva cabo un análisis de dichos cuentos, para lo cual estos de dividen en cuatro categorías: robots, viajes espaciales, civilizaciones alienígenas y elucubraciones teológicas. Se llega a la conclusión general de que en el corpus aparece la figura de un dios terrenal, que ha creado al robot en analogía con la creación del ser humano por Dios. La posición del autor es humanista, en cuanto pone de relieve …

Narrar El Final De Los Tiempos: Misantropía Y Liberación En Dos “Cuentos Atómicos” Del Salvadoreño Álvaro Menen Desleal (1960s), David Díaz Arias

Alambique. Revista académica de ciencia ficción y fantasía / Jornal acadêmico de ficção científica e fantasía

El presente artículo analiza una parte de la obra de ciencia ficción del salvadoreño Álvaro Menen Desleal. Para eso, se concentra en uno de los temas que, aunque no dominante, sí es abordado de forma crítica y sagaz por parte de ese autor: el exterminio de la humanidad a partir de una hecatombe nuclear. Así, se estudian dos cuentos publicados por Menen Desleal en 1969 y que forman parte de su premiado texto Una cuerda de nylon y oro y otros cuentos maravillosos. Los cuentos son el que le da nombre a esa antología de relatos y “Hacer el …

The Future In Fragments: Three Critical Dystopian Works By Fernando Contreras Castro, Matthew Richey

Alambique. Revista académica de ciencia ficción y fantasía / Jornal acadêmico de ficção científica e fantasía

In the prologue to the 2014 edition of Cantos de las Guerras Preventivas, Costa Rican author Fernando Contreras Castro states that the novel, originally published in 2006, originated as a response to the ambiguously-defined military campaigns that dominated the global geopolitical landscape during the first decade of the 21st century. Contreras Castro further explains that the novel is an attempt at imagining near-future worlds from a distinctly Latin American perspective, while avoiding the currents of cyberpunk and paranoid fiction that dominated late 20th century science fiction writing in the United States. The novel also marks a significant departure from …

The Best Children's Picture Books Of The Year In Spanish [2023 Edition], Bank Street College Of Education. Children's Book Committee

The Center for Children's Literature

An annotated list of the best children's books in Spanish published or translated in 2022. In English and Spanish.

Spanish title: Los mejores libros infantiles en Español.

Goats Die, Butterflies Fly: Portrayals Of Dominican Dictator Rafael Trujillo (1891–1961) In Historical Fiction And Non-Fiction, Jocelyn R. Brown

Ramifications

The dictator novel has become a staple of Latin American literature in the 20th century. As the intersection of art, culture, and politics, these novels are interested in painting intimate pictures of their dictator to examine the psychology of power and the lure of authoritarianism. This project focuses on analyzing the the rise and fall of Dominican dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina (1891–1961) through literary lenses. This project compares the ways in which Trujillo and his regime (El Trujillato) are portrayed in both non-fiction and historical fiction. Trujillo was an excellent storyteller, known for his cult of personality …

Ya Llegamos | We Are Here, Audrey Hermila Salgado

Senior Projects Spring 2023

ya llegamos | we are here, a Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College, is piece on gender and migration. It is a play that explores how family dynamics, class issues, education, and gender play a role in why people leave their home country. It explores the journey and relationship of Saturnina and Francisco as they travel across the Mexico/U.S. border.

The Creation Of The Home: A Sociological And Literary Analysis Of Dominicanidad In Public Spaces Of Washington Heights And Within Dominican Literature, Mádoris Isabel Santana Figuereo

Senior Projects Spring 2023

“The Creation of the Home” is a study that puts in conversation theories within sociology of immigration, culture, nationality, urban studies, gentrification, and literature. These realms of study allow us to capture the trajectories of meaning making by Dominican Immigrants in New York City who lived in the homeland for the majority of their childhood. It shows that even when the physical home is endangered by larger structural forces such as economic precarity, gentrification, and displacement, Dominican immigrants continue to center their identity and cultural markers through symbolic recreations of the home. Dominican literature of the Diaspora shows us that …

La Radical Imperfección Del Mundo: El Crimen Perfecto De Jean Baudrillard Y El Crimen Ferpecto De Alex De La Iglesia, Maria A. Gomez

The Coastal Review: An Online Peer-reviewed Journal

Le parfait crime (1995) by Jean Baudrillard and Crimen ferpecto (2004) by the Basque director Alex de la Iglesia are two works that not only have in common almost identical titles. They both reflect on how in consumer societies, an imperfect real world is substituted for an illusory hyperreality in which the distinction between subject and object has disappeared. While Baudrillard explains how the denial of a transcendent reality in contemporary society is “a perfect crime” that destroys the real, Alex de la Iglesia uses black humor and a mix of genres (mainly grotesque comedy and thriller) to show the …

De Médée À La Sorcière : Reconstruction D’Un Mythe Par Michelet, Caroline Strobbe

The Coastal Review: An Online Peer-reviewed Journal

In La Sorcière, Jules Michelet uses the strength and the myth of the Medea character, which had already fascinated Corneille. In the second part of his work, Michelet creates nominative witches after authentic texts. In the first part, he creates an allegoric witch on the Medea model: the Woman, a victim of arbitrariness, injustice and repression, rises up against her oppressors, figuring the march of Humanity towards Enlightenment and Liberty. The analogies between the Witch and Medea are therefore numerous and necessary, since they help to render the defense of the oppressed against the oppressor. Would the somber Medea, …

Communicating With The Past Via Javier Cercas’ Las Leyes De La Frontera, Bobby D. Nixon

The Coastal Review: An Online Peer-reviewed Journal

Cercas’ protagonist, Gafitas, narrates his memories of being a member of "el Zarco's" youth gang in the barrio chino of Girona during the summer of 1978, from the vantage point of the early 2000s. The novel is simultaneously viewed through the intertextual lens of José Antonio de la Loma’s cycle of quinqui films based on the life of the famous Catalan delinquent, El Vaquilla, Juan José Moreno Cuenca. There is renewed interest in these films from the Transition period of the late 1970s and early 1980s, with the success of this novel and director Daniel Monzón's film based on Cercas’ …