Latinidad in Enstranged Lands: Narrative Interjections in Chicanx and Latinx Literature, Film, and Television
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LATINIDAD IN ENSTRANGED LANDS: NARRATIVE INTERJECTIONS IN CHICANX AND LATINX LITERATURE, FILM, AND TELEVISION By Samuel Saldívar III A DISSERTATION Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillments of the requirements for the degree of Chicano/Latino Studies-Doctor of Philosophy English-Doctor of Philosophy 2016 ABSTRACT LATINIDAD IN ENSTRANGED LANDS: NARRATIVE INTERJECTIONS IN CHICANX AND LATINX LITERATURE, FILM, AND TELEVISION By Samuel Saldivar III In the closing lines of the 2000 work Shot in America: Television, the State, and the Rise of Chicano Cinema author Chon Noriega asks his readers, “how do you participate in this world of knowledge and power as something other than a viewer?” (201). Quite honestly, Noriega’s question is one of many that has driven the direction and purpose of my research and scholarship at large. My dissertation, Latinidad in Enstranged Lands: Narrative Interjections in Chicanx and Latinx Literature, Film, and Television has sought to reflect, via narrative, my participations with and complications of knowledge and power within a dominant Anglo American U.S. Consequently, my dissertation has placed a primary emphasis on the constructions, presentations, and representations of Chicanx and Latinx fictional works of narrative that while including fictional works of literature like Corky Gonzales’s Yo Soy Joaquin have also incorporated often identified “alternative” works like comics and graphic novels that also explore the issues of knowledge and power in relation to Chicanxs and Latinxs in the Americas. What I have kept at the center of my analysis, however, has been Chicanxs and Latinxs. Along with Noriega’s question of participation and action as they relate to these particular populations a secondary but equally significant question that asks “what’s new in Chicano/Latino Studies?” or “What has been made new in Chicano/Latino Studies?” has driven my directional explorations of the various narrative forms I have incorporated into my dissertation. To accomplish these goals I turn to Narrative Theory studies which offers a way to broach the various narrative mediums that my dissertation explores. This dissertation explores the specific term Ostranit coined by Russian Formalist Viktor Shklovsky in his 1917 publication Art as Device, and which was translated by Benjamin Sher in 1991 as enstrangement. Although my dissertation has outlined the complicated and rather expansive relationship Scholars like David Herman, and Darko Suvin have had with Shklovsky’s term, my dissertation positions enstrangement as those moments in literature that are made new for readers who are made or are invited to pause and dwell on a particular literary moment or element of the text they are reading. This particular narrative moment for Shklovsky “is when the literary work attains its greatest and most long-lasting impact” (12).The exploration of narrative enstrangement in Chicanx/Latinx narratives is further established by Frederick L. Aldama, who, in A Users Guide to Postcolonial and Latino Borderland Fiction, identifies enstrangement as one of the many narrative elements that an author can use “to push at the boundaries of convention, to deviate unpredictably from aesthetic norms” and wake readers up from a “state of habituation” (36). This means that as we engage Chicanx/Latinx narrative works, the decisions made by authors and directors to use, for example, bilinguality, structure phenotype, and indigenous elements attempt to enstrange, or make new our engagements of Chicanxs and Latinxs while also breaking away from stereotypical dominant American representations of Chicanxs and Latinxs that have been historically perpetuated dominant American narratives. And while scholars like Lemon and Reis understand enstrangement “not so much a device as a result obtainable by an number of devices” (5 Lemon & Reis), enstrangement is nevertheless a significant narrative tool that can invite readers and scholars to engage Chicanx and Latinx works in new and exiting ways. Thus, my work complicates the role of narrative formation in Chicanx/Latinx fictional literatures, films, and televisions by placing close attention to specific moments that make new our engagements of Chicanx/Latinx narratives and introduce an Enstranged Latinidad. Copyright by SAMUEL SALDVAR III 2016 This dissertation is dedicated to the loved ones I have lost while completing this PhD. Samuel Saldivar I You are my own version of John Wayne. Mario Garcia Thank you for all the stories you shared with me around the barbeque pit. To Our Angel I catch glimpses of your beauty in your mother’s smile. Gerardo Garcia Your smile lights up my heart every time I think of you. Maximillian Monroy-Miller Thank you for reminding me to live and love with all of my heart every single day Tomasita Vasquez Ama, gracias por sus oraciones, tu apoyo, tu intelligencia, y tu amor. Te extraño mucho, y fuiste un gran ejemplo del amor y poder de nuestro Padre Eterno. Te amo. Samuel Saldivar Jr. Daddy, I miss you so much it hurts. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This process has been difficult, time-consuming, and tiresome. I want to thank all of those who have made this dissertation possible. I first want to thank God for his blessing and provision through this process. I also want to thank my wife and partner Lydia for being everything our family needed during this process. You are the strongest person I know. To my sons, I love you and I’m sorry for all of the time this experience stole from us. To my mother, thank you for your words of encouragement and love. To my sister Jillian and her family (Jon, Evan, Gianna, and Aubree) I love you. Thanks for being my favorite sister. I also, want to thank my father-in-law Jesus, and my mother-in-law Evilia. Thank you for always treating me like a son. To my brother-in-law Jesus and his family (Jesse, Amado, Andres and Natalia) thank you for the woods, togetherness and family. Thank you to my sister-in-law Belinda and her family (Gabriel, Juve, and Jeremiah) for watching over my family when this PhD process required more of me. I also want to thank Frederick L. Aldama and Chris Gonzalez for all those late night phone calls and immeasurable amounts of guidance during this PhD process. Thanks for always having my back and for standing in my corner. To my academic amigxs: Christian Ramirez, Eric Gonzalez-Juenke, Maximillian Monroy- Miller, Michael McCue, Erin Alvarez, Isabel Ayala, Scott Michelsen, Kristine Byron, Sheila M. Contreras, Salah Hassan, Manuel Martinez, Jesus Garcia and Abel Sanchez. Thank you all for taking the time to teach me, guide me, and offer your expertise during this process. I also want to thank everyone at the Chicano/Latino Studies Program for offering a safe, inclusive space that fostered rigorous research and advocacy. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES…………..…………………………………………………….………... viii INTRODUCTION: Enstranged Latinolandia: Narrative Interjections in Chicano/Latino Literature, Film, and Television ……………………………….......................................................1 CHAPTER 1: Enstranged Indigeneity in Chicanx/Latinx Narratives...........................................19 CHAPTER 2: Dirty, Stinking, Aliens: Chicanxs and Latinxs in Today’s Sci-Fi Televisual Blueprint........................................................................................................................................42 CHAPTER 3: Paratextual Reimaginations of Chicanx/Latinx Characters in DjangoZorro and Red Wolf................................................................................................................................................65 CHAPTER 4: Reimagining the Brown Screen: Narrative Mexicanidad In Robert Rodriguez’s Machete and Justin Lin’s Fast & Furious.......................................................................................93 CHAPTER 5: I’m Picking up Good (Vibe)rations: The Hopeful Progression of Chicanx and Latinx Trajectories in U.S. American Narrative………………………………………..…. …..115 ENDNOTES…………………………………………………………………………………...127 BIBLIOGRAPHY......................................................................................................................129 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Satánico Pandemonium makes her entrance…………………………………………. 36 Figure 2 Mexica Dancer calls the winds in La Mission………………………………………… 40 Figure 3: Che, via Mexica dancers, is confronted with his cultural and historical role as oppressor ……………………………………………………………………………………………………40 Figure 4: Undocumented border crosser José, played by Sergio Calderon, being discovered as Mikey the illegally intergalactic Earth crosser in Men in Black................................... 43 Figure 5: Stills from Rodriguez’s trailer Machete Kills Again: In Space that introduces the titular character, played by Danny Trejo, as a light-saber machete wielding astronaut….…. 47 Figure 6: Caprica. Esai Morales as Yoseph Adama and Eric Stoltz as Daniel Graystone……... 53 Figure 7: The Event. Blair Underwood as President Martinez with family…………………...... 57 Figure 8: Conchita..……………………………………………………………………………... 73 Figure 9: Conchita receives her new name.……………………………………………..……......76 Figure 10: Consuela Ave Maria de Peralta de Cordoba back in the United States….………….. 77 Figure 11: Consuela struggles with language…………...………………………………………. 81 Figure 12: Consuela in power………………………………………………………………….... 85 Figure 13: Consuela after releasing her power……………………………………………….…. 85 Figure 14: Red Wolf………………………………………………………………………….…. 87 Figure 15: Sheriff’s Deputy