Twentieth Century Latin American Cultural and Intellectual History: Metamorphoses of Ideas, Subjectivities and Discourses: Alhelí Alvarado-Díaz Spring 2013 ILAS, Columbia University
1968 Protest, Tlatelolco México
Seminar Rationale and Description
This seminar will examine some of the central debates in the cultural and intellectual history of twentieth century Latin America. Through close readings and critical analysis of primary sources and secondary literature, students will acquire insight on:
1. The metamorphoses of the idea and the reality of Latin American identities in relation to the colonial past and to the ongoing dynamics of political change, artistic innovation and consumer trends. 2. The evolution of the discourse of justice, political rights and revolutionary action according to influential Latin American militants such as Ernesto Guevara, Carlos Marighella and Subcomandante Marcos. 3. The redefinition of social norms and the rupture with the ancien régime of morality as represented in Latin American literature, film and music after 1968.
1 The course seeks to enrich the existing curricular offerings in the fields of Latin American Cultural Studies, Intellectual History and Political Anthropology. Students will be exposed to different analytical discourses including political philosophy, cultural history, sociology, intellectual history, film studies and ethnomusicology. The seminar will emphasize an exploration and a critical deconstruction of the the concept of Latin American identity. Students will reflect on the Latin American appropriation of European philosophy and political theory and on the diverse discourses and subjectivities within the Latin American community. The reading program and discussions will emphasize parallels with Western European thought in the central philosophical, cultural and political discourses of Latin America. The seminar will promote an interdisciplinary, comparative and transcultural interpretation of the Latin American reality exploring its uniqueness, but also its connections with other world cultural and intellectual heritages. Students will develop their understanding of the topic through original critical thinking in active and consistent class discussion, one book review essay and a final research paper.
Course Requirements The final evaluation breakdown will consist of:
Mid-Term Review Essay 20% Final Research Paper 50% Class Participation 30%
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Twentieth Century Latin American Cultural and Intellectual History: Metamorphoses of Ideas, Subjectivities and Discourses: Alhelí Alvarado-Díaz Spring 2013
I. Revolution and the New Latin American Self: Bolívar, Martí, Mariátegui
Distinctions and Singularities of the Latin American Reality The Defense of the Hispanic Self and the Resistance to American Hegemony The Limits of the Latin American Prophets
Readings
Simón Bolívar, “Address Delivered at the Inauguration of the Second National Congress of Venezuela”, Latin American Philosophy for the 21st Century, Jorge Gracia and Elizabeth Millán, eds., Prometheus Books, 2004.
José Martí, “Our America”, “My Race”, Latin American Philosophy for the 21st Century, Jorge Gracia and Elizabeth Millán, eds., Prometheus Books, 2004.
José Carlos Mariátegui, “Seven Interpretative Essays on Peruvian Reality”, Latin American Philosophy for the 21st Century, Jorge Gracia and Elizabeth Millán, eds., Prometheus Books, 2004.
Enrique Krauze, “José Martí: The Martyrdom of the Liberator”, “José Enrique Rodó: The Hispanic American Homily”, “José Carlos Mariátegui: Indigenous Marxism”, Redeemers. Ideas and Power in Latin America, Harper Collins, 2011.
II. The Reception of European Philosophy in Latin America: Korn, Astrada and Zea
The Reception of Positivism in Mexico The Phenomenology Effect
Readings
Alejandro Korn, “Philosophical Notes”, Latin American Philosophy for the 21st Century, Jorge Gracia and Elizabeth Millán, eds., Prometheus Books, 2004.
Carlos Astrada, “Existentialism and the Crisis of Philosophy”, Latin American Philosophy for the 21st Century, Jorge Gracia and Elizabeth Millán, eds., Prometheus Books, 2004.
3 Manuel Garrido, “Ortega y Gasset’s Heritage in Latin America”, A Companion to Latin American Philosophy, Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte and Otávio Bueno, eds., Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.
Arturo Ardao, “Assimilation and Transformation of Positivism in Latin America”, Journal of the History of Ideas 24 (1963): 515-22.
III. Revolution, Art and Political Identities
The Legend of Villa and Zapata Art and Politics after the Mexican Revolution The Politics of Diego Rivera’s Muralist School
Readings
Frank Mclynn, “The Rise of Zapata”, “The Rise of Villa”, “The Fall of Díaz”, “The Twilight of Zapatismo”, Villa and Zapata: A History of the Mexican Revolution, Basic Books, 2002.
Friedrich Katz, “From the Frontier to the Border”, “The Revolution”, “The Villista Leaders”, “Villa’s Two-Front War with Carranza and the United States”, The Life and Times of Pancho Villa, Stanford University Press, 1998.
Anthony W. Lee, “Revolution on the Walls and in the Streets”, “Artists, Unite!”, Painting on the Left: Diego Rivera, Radical Politics, and San Francisco's Public Murals, University of California Press, 1999.
IV. Revolutionary Redemption, Urban Guerrillas and the Discourse of Martyrdom: Ernesto Guevara
The Reception of Marx in Latin America The Guerrilla Concept
Readings
Ernesto Guevara, “Guerrilla Warfare”, Che Guevara Reader: Writings on Politics & Revolution, Ocean Press, 2003.
Paco Ignacio Taibo, “The Discovery of Latin America”, “Scratching the Dirt”, “Commander”, “Controversy”, “Day One of the Revolution”, Guevara also known as Che, St. Martin’s Press, 1997.
Enrique Krauze, “Che Guevara: The Saint Enraged”, Redeemers. Ideas and Power in Latin America, Harper Collins, 2011.
4 V. The Church of the Oppressed: Liberation Theology
Marxism, the Bible and Christian Thought The Idea of Justice in the Discourse of Liberation Theology
Readings
Oscar Romero, The Violence of Love, Orbis Books, 2004.
Leonardo Boff, “The Basic Question”, “The Three Levels of Liberation Theology”, “How Liberation Theology is Done”, “Key Themes of Liberation Theology”, Introducing Liberation Theology, Orbis Books, 1987.
James Cone, “The Social Context of Theology”, “Liberation and the Christian Ethic”, “Biblical Liberation and Social Existence”, God of the Oppressed, Orbis Books, 1997.
Ivan Petrella, “The Present and the Future of Latin American Theology”, The Future of Liberation Theology: An Argument and Manifesto, SCM Press, 2006.
Film: Romero (John Duigan, 1989)
VI. The Reception of Psychoanalysis in Latin America
Reading Freud and Lacan in Latin America The Politics of Memory and the Reinvention of Collective Identity
Readings
Mariano Ben Plotkin, “The Beginnings of Psychoanalysis in Argentina”, “The Founding of the APA and the Development of the Argentine Psychoanalytic Movement”, “Politics, Lacanianism and the Intellectual Left”, Freud in the Pampas. The Emergence and Development of a Psychoanalytic Culture in Argentina, Stanford University Press, 2001.
Bruno Bosteels, “The Overdevelopment of Memories”, Marx and Freud in Latin America, Verso, 2012.
Rubén Ardila, “Psychology in Latin America Today”, Annual Review of Psychology 33 (1982): 103-22.
VII. The Jewish Diaspora in Latin America
The Evolution of Jewish-Latin American Identities
5 Synagogues and Jewish Neighborhoods in the Tropics
Readings
Mordechai Arbell, “The Settlement of the Caribbean Jews”, The Jewish Nation of the Caribbean: The Spanish-Portuguese Jewish Settlements in the Caribbean and the Guianas, Gefen Publishing House, 2002.
Nelson Vieira, “Outsiders and Insiders: Brazilian Jews and the Discourse of Alterity”, The Jewish Diaspora in Latin America. New Studies on History and Literature, Garland, 1996.
Robert M. Levine, “Jews under the Cuban Revolution: 1959-1995”, The Jewish Diaspora in Latin America. New Studies on History and Literature, Garland, 1996.
VIII. The Evolution of the Rebel and the Ideal of Radical Change in the Sixties and Beyond
The Cuban Revolution: Philosophy and Reality Fidel The Psychology of the Latin American Rebels
Readings
Tad Szulc, “The Revolution (1959-1963)”, Fidel: A Critical Portrait, Harper, 2000.
Samuel Farber, “Fidel Castro and the Cuban Populist Tradition”, “U.S. Policy and the Cuban Revolution”, The Origins of the Cuban Revolution Reconsidered, University of North Carolina Press, 2006.
Aviva Chomsky, “Experiments with Socialism”, “Relations with the United States”, A History of the Cuban Revolution, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.
IX. The Rejection of Convention: Feministas and Sexual Workers after 1968
Feminism and Political Revolution The Market of Sex in Latin America
Readings
Kamala Kempadoo, “Sex, Work, Gifts, and Money: Prostitution and Other Sexual- Economic Transactions”, Sexing the Caribbean. Gender, Race, and Sexual Labor, Routledge, 2004.
6 Virginia Vargas, “The Struggle by Latin American Feminisms for Rights and Autonomy”, Gender and the Politics of Rights and Democracy in Latin America, Palgrave, 2002.
Jasmine Gideon, “Economic and Social Rights: Exploring Gender Differences in a Central American Context”, Gender and the Politics of Rights and Democracy in Latin America, Palgrave, 2002.
Linda L. Reif, “Women in Latin American Guerrilla Movements: A Comparative Perspective”, Comparative Politics, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Jan., 1986), pp. 147-169.
X. Rebels, Poets and Rockers: Infrarrealismo, Cultivated Masturbators and Postcolonial Indigentes in the Counter-Culture of the 1970s
Mexican Anti-Poetry and the Celebration of Individualism Rock Stars and the Construction of Radical Liberty
Readings
Roberto Bolaño et al., Manifiesto Infrarrealista, 1975.
Eric Zolov, “Rebeldismo in the Revolutionary Family: Rock ‘n’ Roll’s Early Impact on Mexican State and Society”, “La Onda: Mexico’s Counterculture and the Student Movement of 1968”, Refried Elvis. The Rise of the Mexican Counterculture, University of California Press, 1999.
Deborah Pacini Hernández and Reebee Garófalo, “Between Rock and a Hard Place: Negotiating Rock in Revolutionary Cuba, 1960-1980”, Rockin’ Las Americas: The Global Politics Of Rock In Latin/o America, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2004.
Pablo Semán, Pablo Vila and Cecilia Benedetti, “Neoliberalism and Rock in the Popular Sectors of Contemporary Argentina”, Rockin’ Las Americas: The Global Politics Of Rock In Latin/o America, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2004.
XI. Death, Power and Drug Empires: Pablo Escobar and the Economy of Drug Trafficking
From Rags to Riches: Portrait of the Narcos Drug Dealing, Political Control and Economic Progress
Readings
Ioan Grillo, “Hippies”, “Cartels”, “Warlords”, “Traffic”, “Murder””, El Narco. Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency, Bloomsbury Press, 2011.
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Marc Bowden, “The Rise of El Doctor”, “The First War” Killing Pablo. The Hunt for the World’s Greatest Outlaw, Atlantic Monthly Press, 2001.
Mary Roldán, “Colombia: cocaine and the “miracle” of modernity in Medellín”, Cocaine. Global histories, Routledge, 1999.
Films: Maria, Full of Grace (Joshua Marston, 2004)
XII. Musical Experimentation and the Liberation of Desire
The Musical Innovators of Brazil and the Caribbean Urban Music and the Liberalization of Sexuality
Readings
Caetano Veloso, “Bossa Nova”, “To Hell with Everything and I’ll Give You Heaven: Brazilian Rock”, “Tropicália”, Avant-Garde”, “Prohibiting is Prohibited”, Tropical Truth. A Story of Music and Revolution in Brazil, Alfred A. Knopf, 2002.
Christopher Dunn, “The Tropicalist Moment”, Tropicália, Counterculture, and Afro- Diasporic Connections”, Brutality Garden. Tropicália and the Emergence of a Brazilian Counterculture, The University of North Carolina Press, 2001.
Juan Flores, “What’s All the Noise About?”, Reggaeton, Duke University Press, 2009.
Janice Perlman, “Cities and Squatters”, “Political Marginality: Participation and Radicalism”, The Myth of Marginality. Urban Poverty and Politics in Rio de Janeiro, University of California Press, 1976.
XIII. Split Identities: The Latin American Diaspora in the US
US-Latin American Relations Revisited “Us versus Them”: American Immigration Policy and the Redefinition of the Latin American People
Readings
Juan Flores, “Islands and Enclaves”, Latinos: Remaking America, Marcelo Suárez- Orozco, ed., University of California Press, 2002.
Alex Stepick and Carol Stepick, “Power and Identity: Miami Cubans”, Latinos: Remaking America, Marcelo Suárez-Orozco, ed., University of California Press, 2002.
8 Wayne A. Cornelius, “Ambivalent Reception: Mass Public Responses to the “New” Latino Immigration to the United States”, Latinos: Remaking America, Marcelo Suárez-Orozco, ed., University of California Press, 2002.
Ana Zentalla, “Hablamos los dos. We speak both”, “The Hows and Whys of Spanglish”, Growing Up Bilingual, Wiley-Blackwell, 1997.
XIV. The Idea of Inter-subjectivity, Progress and Solidarity in Latin America’s New Millenium
The Idea of New Leadership in Latin America Redefining Sovereignty and Inter-American Collaboration The New Idea of the Latin American Self
Readings
Eduardo Galeano, “Development is a Voyage with More Shipwrecks than Navigators”, Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent, Monthly Review Press, 1997.
Aleida Guevara, “Venezuela today”, “Exorcising ourselves from Bolivar’s curse”, “The revolutionary process”, “Social welfare programs”, Chávez, Venezuela and the New Latin America, Ocean Press, 2005.
Martín Sivak, “Cocalero”, “The President”, Evo Morales: The Extraordinary Rise of the First Indigenous President of Bolivia, Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
Gustavo Flores-Macias, “Party Systems and Leftist Governments’ Economic Policies”, After Neoliberalism? The Left and Economic Reforms in Latin America, Oxford University Press, 2012.
Benjamin Goldfrank, “The Left and Participatory Democracy: Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela”, After Neoliberalism? The Left and Economic Reforms in Latin America, Oxford University Press, 2012.
Films: South of the Border (Oliver Stone, 2009)
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