En contexto del desarrollo urbano culturalmente acrítico, el cual con la gentrificación amenaza el bienestar del barrio y sus habitantes, esta disertación interpreta la dialéctica barrioización y barriología como atmósfera dramática en la dramaturgia chicana. Como tropo de supervivencia social y ontológica en la producción cultural chicana, la recurrencia literaria del barrio también queda reflejada en la temática y las formas de numerosas obras de teatro chicano. De tal modo, el análisis de la conciencia espacial chicana en Bernabé (1971) y Heroes and Saints (1994) revela la significancia de un sentido de lugar colectivo y sitúa esta interpretación dramática del barrio en torno al matiz ideológico de la evolución de la conciencia espacial chicana. Manifestada como una dialéctica entre muerte y vida social y ontológica, la representación y representatividad del barrio en La trampa sin salida (1973), Water and Power (2009) y A Drunkard’s Tale of Melted Wings and Memories (2016) ilustra el efecto dramático de la dialéctica entre barrioización y barriología. Mientras algunos estudios precedentes a este han explorado la espacialidad chicana y el significado sociocultural del barrio, esta disertación es la primera en demonstrar concomitantemente la función temática y semiótica del barrio en la configuración de la atmósfera dramática en el teatro chicano. Más aún, la intersección entre barrio, espacio social y teatro no solo revelan la significancia semiótica de la atmósfera dramática, si no que también sostienen la urgencia de fomentar la (re)producción socioespacial urbana históricamente informada y culturalmente crítica.

The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the materiality of a unique text, Random House and The Illustrated Modern Library’s 1946 Don Quixote, illustrated by Catalonian painter Salvador Dalí. It analyzes Dalí’s classical trajectory, how Dalí and the text were received in mid-twentieth century North America, and how they both fit into the print history of illustrated editions of Don Quixote. Each is revealed to be unique in comparison with the history of the genre due to the publishing house’s utilization of Dalí’s high-quality illustrations in a small-sized text. Lavish illustrations traditionally have been reserved for larger, collectible editions. The contemporary material significance of the 1946 edition is revealed by examining organizations, people, and circumstances that were necessary for its production in the United States, and by contextualizing the text’s reception by North American popular culture, high art echelons, and art critics.

The overarching history of illustrated editions of Don Quixote is examined, comparing Dalí and his illustrations with important thematic and methodological benchmarks set by illustrators within this 400-year period, especially regarding renderings of reality and fantasy. Analyses of the first three watercolor illustrations of Dalí’s 1946 Don Quixote reveal how the painter forms mythological imagery and composes the quixotic dichotomy of reality and fantasy through the metaphoric gaze of an inanimate figure representing the protagonist. Dalí at times renders the “real” Don Quixote as incapacitated, omitting from his illustrations universalized iconography utilized in previous centuries achieved by rendering Don Quixote’s perspective, gaze, and heroic interpretation of events. In these three illustrations, Dalí forms Don Quixote as a deflated figure based in burla (mockery) and engaño (self-deception) by negating Don Quixote’s gaze within the compositions, without compromising the painter’s trademark surrealist style.

The text therefore challenges the genre’s print history while Dalí challenges French and German Romantic illustrators’ universalized iconography that traditionally highlights the nobility of the knight errant. By focalizing fantastic madness as interacting with burlesque reality, Dalí creates a new episteme within the genre of illustrated editions of Don Quixote, establishing his unique niche as an illustrator in this genre.

Esta disertación explora la descripción del espacio turístico de costa a través de tres novelas contemporáneas. El análisis de Antagonía, El Tercer Reich y Crematorio revela tanto un cambio en la percepción sobre el turismo de masas en los últimos cuarenta años, en el que se rechaza el turismo de masas por su impacto negativo en el espacio natural, como el uso de unas convenciones literarias específicas que hunden sus raíces en el siglo XIX, lo que nos permite afirmar la presencia de un cronotopo; el cronotopo del turismo de costa.

La originalidad de nuestra investigación radica en el acercamiento a un tema de importancia que la crítica literaria todavía no ha estudiado en profundidad. Era necesario investigar las novelas turísticas contemporáneas de costa con una perspectiva amplia, permitiendo observar no sólo el pasado sino también las distintas direcciones de este campo específico. El presente análisis busca servir de modelo a futuras investigaciones.

In the face of what many scientists and cultural theorists are calling the Anthropocene, a new era characterized by catastrophic human impact on the planet’s geologic, atmospheric, and ecological makeup, Latin American writers, artists, and filmmakers today from various disciplinary and geographical positionalities are engaging in debates about how to respond ethically to this global crisis. From an interdisciplinary perspective that incorporates cutting-edge theories in multispecies ethnography, material ecocriticism, and queer ecology, this study examines multispecies relationships unfolding in three telescoping dimensions—corporealities, companions, and communities—in contemporary Latin American cultural production while uncovering indigenous and other-than-dominant epistemologies about human-nonhuman entanglements. I argue that contemporary cultural expression uncovers long, overlapping histories of social and environmental exploitation and resistance while casting the moment of encounter between individuals of different species as hopeful figurations of human-nonhuman flourishing beyond the Anthropocene. Instead of remaining hopelessly mired in the dire geographies of planetary decline, the works of Uruguayan writer Teresa Porzecanski, Mexican author Daniela Tarazona, Mexican textile sculptor Alejandra Zermeño, Argentine filmmaker Lucía Puenzo, Colombian installation artist María Fernanda Cardoso, Colombian poet Juan Carlos Galeano, Colombian graphic artist Solmi Angarita, and Brazilian poet Astrid Cabral dramatize a multitude of multispecies encounters to imagine the possibility of a better world—one that is already as close as our skin and as present as the nonhuman “others” that constitute our existence. These works imagine the human itself as a product of multispecies interactions through evolutionary time, multispecies companionships as formed around queer kinships, and biocultural communities as emerging through communicative, ethical encounters.

Using Michel Foucault’s archaeological and genealogical approaches, this study analyzes the influence of discourse—particularly the discursive impact of the short story, novel, poetry, chronicle, essay, film, photography, and comics—in shaping how soccer has become known in Latin America. The analysis not only considers how the so-called “beautiful game” and related texts have been embedded with dominant ideologies—among these heteronormativity, nationalism, elitism, and neoliberalism—but also how resisting discursive forces have attempted to deconstruct these notions. The following pages demonstrate that soccer in Latin America represents more than just a mere sport, but rather a significant social and cultural entity that facilitates an understanding of the region. Furthermore, by providing a critical view of one of the region’s most powerful cultural institutions, this study sheds light on how dominant individuals use the sport and popular culture to construct knowledge and guide social practices.

In the last three years, a transition from Catholicism to other religious affiliations has been observed of Hispanic Americans. According to a study by the Pew Research Center in 2013, there are now 24% Hispanics who are now ex-Catholics. This dissertation examines the religious trending away of Chicanas and Chicanos from Catholicism in particular. It contributes to the field of Chicano cultural studies by exploring religious expressions and spiritualities that are an alternative to traditional Catholicism from 1960 to 2014. Chapters One and Two are a foundation to this investigation, as they provide a brief historical contextualization of religiosity in Chicano culture, as well as explain the theoretical framework utilized throughout the dissertation. Chapter Three examines the activism of Reies López Tijerina, a Pentecostal preacher, and Ignacio García, a devout Mormon, in the 1960s and 1970s. Their autobiographies are studied, particularly focusing on how their religion became an integral part to in their awareness as they became involved in the Chicano Movement. Chapter Four explores the representation and relationships between spiritual figures of the Chicana mother in the following works: the artworks Housewife Battles Self (1994) by Max-Carlos Martínez, Tonantzin, the Aztec Earth Goddess (2001) by Dolores Guerrero, and the novels So Far from God (1993) by Ana Castillo and Esperanza’s Box of Saints (1999) by María Amparo Escandón. Finally, Chapter Five presents religious expression and spirituality in the borderlands experience. In this chapter several popular saints are studied, including the Texas curandero, don Pedrito Jaramillo, and the images of Jesús Malverde and la Santa Muerte.

ABSTRACT

This interdisciplinary study examines the linguistic strategies that determine perception of female representation in Peruvian feminist narrative during the late XIX century. It uses as reference narratives that are considered representatives of the literary tendencies of Latin América feminine trajectory. The feminine subject was studied in two novels of Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera: Los amores de Hortensia (1886) and Blanca Sol (1889). The novels were selected with the aim of capturing the evolution and the development of the female characters as self-realizing subjects.

The theoretical framework is led by the speech act philosophy of John Austin, John Searle, and Victoria Escandell Vidal. The feminist literary theory is guided by the feminist principle of Judith Butler, Luce Irigaray and Julia Kristeva that relates to the development of female subjectivity; by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar, and Virginia Woolf that reveals the dynamics of women’s creativity.

Through a close analysis of the speech acts, the research demonstrates that the female characters used their tactics to complain and request on their attempts to uproot the hegemonic normative social structures. The speech acts are presented as key instrument for a better understanding of the complex mechanisms of language, through which the feminist ideology of the nineteenth century is transmitted and reproduced. Within feminist theory the purpose is to show how the performative nature of language can be applied to the concept of power as subversive resistance. While the evolution of the female protagonists through the different spaces they move were traced, the investigation’s central idea that envisions the feminine subject as a process, was also examined.

After comparing and contrasting the portrayal of the protagonists, a thematic analysis was performed to capture the intricacies of meaning within the discourse. The analysis suggests that female representation in literature can be reexamined through historical, political, and socio-economic contexts, as well as through verbal expression.

Mainly, the comventional norms that limited women to some social places and that oblige them to maintain proper conducts did not silence them entirely, as we can observe in the petitions and complaints that became transcendent acts of defiance.





ABSTRACTO

Este trabajo de investigación interdisciplinario examina las estrategias lingüísticas que condicionan la percepción de la representación femenina y feminista en la narrativa peruana de finales del siglo XIX. El sujeto femenino se ha estudiado en dos novelas de Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera Los amores de Hortensia (1886) y Blanca Sol (1889), éstas se seleccionaron con el objetivo de entender la evolución de los personajes femeninos como sujetos que se auto-realizan.

El marco teórico para este estudio es guiado por la filosofía hermeneútica de John Austin, John Searle y Victoria Escandell que se basan en la naturaleza performativa de las expresiones lingüísticas. El análisis de género se basa en la teoría de Judith Butler Luce Irigaray y Julia Kristeva que se relacionan con el desarrollo de la subjetividad femenina; en la ideología de Sandra Gilbert y Susan Gubar y Virginia Woolf que exponen las dinámicas de creatividad de la escritora.

A través del análisis de los actos de habla, la investigación sugiere que los personajes femeninos usan estrategias de quejas y de pedidos con el intento de eliminar las estructuras sociales hegemónicas. Los actos de habla se presentan como un instrumento necesario para un mejor entendimiento de los mecanismos del lenguaje, por medio de los cuales se transmite la idea feminista del siglo XIX. La teoría feminista tiene como objetivo, explicar cómo la naturaleza performativa del lenguaje se puede adaptar al concepto de poder como resistencia subversiva. Se investiga la idea central de nuestra pesquisa que percibe al sujeto femenino como un sujeto en proceso. Después de comparar y contrastar el perfil de los personajes protagónicos, se lleva a cabo el análisis temático para captar las complejidades del sentido en el discurso. Esta investigación propone que la representación femenina puede ser reevaluada por medio de contextos históricos, políticos y socio-económicos y de expresiones verbales.¬

En general, las normas convencionales del siglo XIX que limitaron a la mujer a ciertas esferas sociales y que requerían de ésta una conducta discreta, no las silenciaron totalmente como se puedo apreciar en los pedidos y quejas que resultaron ser medios trascendentes de actos de desafío.

Beginning in the late 20th century, Spanish writers have shown great concern for matters relating to the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) and its aftermath. In narratives, they reveal, explicitly or implicitly, hidden events covered by the Franco dictatorship (1939-75). This persistence in their works about the past has been examined as necessary to society in overcoming the terrible events that occurred during the Franco's regime. Also, these narratives stand as a loud voice against impunity regarding crimes committed for almost half a century and the actual ongoing denial of the State to investigate, in depth, the crimes carried out in the past. Within this denial of the State, the disappearance of children took place during the postwar up until the first democratic government, established in 1978.

The objective of this research is to show, via fiction, the oppression and the manipulation of women during the Francoist period through different institutions, among them, Sección Femenina. Also, this study aims to prove that the separation of children from Republican mothers during the dictatorship, and later on from single poor mothers during the early years of the first democracy, was in violation of both the maternity rights of women and the children's rights. This investigation focuses on the novels Mala gente que camina (2006) by Benjamín Prado, Si a los tres años no he vuelto (2011) by Ana R. Cañil and Mientras pueda pensarte (2013) by Inmaculada Chacón. These literary works contest the stealing of children as a legitimized action with the appearance of goodness. The theoretical approaches selected for this study are: the abjection concept of Julia Kristeva, the hegemonic ideology of Antonio Gramsci; and lastly, the legalization of punishment of Michel Foucault.

The originality of this research as thesis lies to shine a light on the novels mentioned above as the evidence of the violation of the rights of motherhood and the biological family as a whole during the Franco dictatorship and again later during the early stages of Spanish democracy.

In this work we review certain biographical and historical data concerning Sor Juana and María Luisa, Condesa de Paredes. In addition, we have chosen Ovillejos 214, Romance 61, Redondillas 90 and 91 as poems that provides important insight into their relationship of patronage and friendship. In order to delineate theoretically both aspects of this relationship --the public and the personal-- we make use of the concept of ekphrasis proposed by Frederick de Armas. This concept is applied to the analysis of Romance 61, which is in the tradition of the lyrical Petrarchan portrait. Redondillas 90 and 91 are examined from the theoretical perspective of Cicero's amicitia, which serves to define an alternative model of feminine amicitia. In constructing this model, we review the written criticism surrounding María de Zayas' comedy, La traición en la amistad (1635). This criticism insists on a certain configuration of feminine friendship necessary for understanding the relationship between the two women. As is demonstrated in the analysis of the poems, the two women developed a mutual and permanent affection for one another until the death of Sor Juana in 1695. The Condesa de Paredes also provided practical support to Sor Juana for the publication of her first book, Inundación castálida (1689), which launched her to literary fame. To date there have been no critical studies that apply the concepts of ekphrasis and feminine friendship to the study of anecdotal clues found in the poems of Sor Juana for analyzing the nature of her relationship with the Condesa. This is the contribution of the present work.