Digital Commons Network^™

Voicing A Transnational Latina Poetics: The Dedication Poems Of Amelia Denis And Carlota Gutierrez, Vanessa Ovalle Perez

English Faculty Publications

This article explores the transnational and gendered aspects of nineteenth-century poem dedications authored by women in Spanish-language newspapers. These intimate exchanges routinely contaminated the public sphere with very personal missives, resulting in the development of a genre that was both socially performative and literary. The article considers a previously unstudied exchange between the Central American poet Amelia Denis and the Mexican-American poet Carlota S. Gutierrez as a flashpoint for thinking through these issues. In September of 1875, Denis dedicated a poem "A la Señorita Carlota S. Gutierrez" in the San Salvador newspaper La America Central. Gutierrez published her response in …