The Politics of the Aesthetic in the Southern Cone By
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Apollo Radical Democracies: The Politics of the Aesthetic in the Southern Cone by Katherine Critchfield King’s College University of Cambridge This dissertation is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2017 1 Preface This dissertation is the result of my own work and includes nothing which is the outcome of work done in collaboration except where specifically indicated in the text. It is not substantially the same as any that I have submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for a degree or diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution. I further state that no substantial part of my dissertation has already been submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for any such degree, diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution. It does not exceed the prescribed word limit for the relevant Degree Committee. 2 Acknowledgements To the Arts and Humanities Research Council who generously awarded the grant that funded this research project. To King’s College, and especially for its support of me in times of financial hardship. Looking back, I can scarcely believe I was fortunate enough to call that wonderful and inspiring place home. To Dr. Rory O’Bryen, who has been the most outstanding academic supervisor. Your belief in me as a student and scholar, and the time and energy you invested in me from our very first meeting, has made all of this possible. The overwhelming credit for any academic successes I have had lies firmly at your door. Thank you for nurturing my interest in Latin American culture, and for giving me confidence in my abilities as a writer. Thank you for sharing your expertise so generously, and for helping me to find my own voice. Thank you for being so patient with me over the course of a somewhat unconventional PhD, and for still being in my corner at the end of it all. To the academic staff and the Centre for Latin American Studies and the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages at The University of Cambridge. I was so very fortunate to encounter two such welcoming and supportive departments over my time as a student at Cambridge. I owe especial thanks to Dr. Geoffrey Kantaris whose work with me during my MPhil helped to clarify and expand many of the strands of thought that came together in this work. Thanks are also due to Dr. Steven Boldy, who read parts of this work and gave invaluable feedback. Finally, I offer heartfelt thanks to Dr. Joanna Page, who served as my PhD advisor, and offered both academic and personal mentorship. I truly appreciate all of your encouragement and support over all the years I have known you. To my parents, whose support and love I know I can always count on. Thank you for giving me the gifts of curiosity, self-reliance, and confidence. Thank you for helping me to travel and experience the beauty and wonder of the world. Thank you for teaching me the value of hard work, and for trusting and encouraging me to forge my own path. To my husband, Luke. Many great things came out of my time at Cambridge, and meeting you was surely the best of them all. You are my unfailing supporter, believing in me and in my work even when I lose faith. I can’t imagine my life without you by my side. You are my best friend, and the person who knows me most truly. And finally, to my beautiful, clever, funny, and kind children, Callan and Teagan. You are the reason for everything I do, and I can’t even express how much I love you. You make the world brighter and better each and every day. When I am with you, I am home. 3 Table of Contents Introduction: Wounded Democracies....................................................................................4 The Wounding of Democracy........................................................................................5 Argentina and Chile: The Creation of the ‘demos-gracia’...........................................14 Democratic Dissensus..................................................................................................28 The Politics of the Aesthetic........................................................................................32 A Plan of the Work.......................................................................................................42 I. Democratic Spaces: CADA and the Re-Emergence of the Avant-Garde......................46 Introduction: Fragmentation and Synthesis..................................................................47 Re-Entrenchments of the Avant-Garde........................................................................52 Divisions and Hierarchies............................................................................................55 The Division of Spheres...............................................................................................59 The Division of Labour................................................................................................63 Subjectivation and Interpellation..................................................................................67 Beyond Biopolitical Control........................................................................................72 Politics and the Supplement.........................................................................................76 Thinking Politics and Aesthetics After CADA............................................................82 II. Displacing Identities: Nomadic Desires of the ciudad-ano............................................83 Introduction: A Queer Art?..........................................................................................84 The Desiring Subject: Identity and Disidentification...................................................91 The ciudad-ano...........................................................................................................101 The De-Centred Subject.............................................................................................108 Sensible Partitions: Sex and the Body........................................................................115 Desiring Death: Violence and the Erotic....................................................................120 Relational Becomings.................................................................................................126 Conclusion: Togetherness, Apart...............................................................................131 III. Community Beyond Consensus: Political Poetry in the Aftermath of Dictatorship....................................................................................................................133 Introduction: The Political Labour of Poetry.............................................................134 Community and Equality............................................................................................142 Fragmentation and Deferred Redemption..................................................................151 Alienation and the Fractured Encounter with Otherness............................................164 I Contain Multitudes: Dialogues with Otherness.......................................................171 Relational Forces: Finitude and Love........................................................................183 Conclusion: Enacting Dispute....................................................................................186 Conclusion: The Love with Which I Hate..........................................................................188 Refusing the Limit......................................................................................................189 Works Cited..........................................................................................................................195 4 Introduction: Wounded Democracies 5 Herencia neoliberal o futuro despegue capitalista en la economía de esta ‘demos-gracia’. Un futuro inalcanzable para estos chicos, un chiste cruel de la candidatura, la traición de la candidatura, la traición de la patria libre. Salvándose de las botas para terminar charqueados en la misma carroña, en el mismo estropajo que los vio nacer. Pedro Lemebel, La esquina es mi corazón The Wounding of Democracy The Chilean author Pedro Lemebel (1952-2015) fashioned much of his narrative from a denouncement of the illusory and spurious nature of political transition in Chile, with his crónicas overwhelmingly working to expose the delusion of democracy that characterises the neoliberal post-dictatorship era. As highlighted in the epigraph above, in ‘La esquina es mi corazón (o los New Kids del bloque)’, published in the collection of the same name in 1995, Lemebel lambasts the political and economic order that continues to create subjects who are so marginal, so abject, as to scarcely exist. Or rather, to exist surrounded by a (literal and figurative) violence that leaves its marks on their environment and on their very bodies. A far cry from the illusion of economic progress that sustains the narrative of the transition to democracy, these new kids are stultified on the street corner, surrounded by ‘surcos’ and ‘grietas’, a disintegrating infrastructure in a part of the city nobody cares about. The kids themselves are ‘charqueados’, ‘hacinados’, ‘carne de cañón’, ‘desecho sudamericano’, beaten up and broken down. Like yesterday’s throwaway commodities, they too are obsolescent