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Negotiating Nicaraguan Identity in Costa Rica: the Performance of Affect in Desde El Barro Al Sur Megan Thornton John Carroll University, [email protected]

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Negotiating Nicaraguan Identity in Costa Rica: the Performance of Affect in Desde El Barro Al Sur Megan Thornton John Carroll University, Mthornton@Jcu.Edu John Carroll University Carroll Collected Classical and Modern Languages and Literatures Spring 2016 Negotiating Nicaraguan Identity in Costa Rica: The performance of Affect in Desde el barro al sur Megan Thornton John Carroll University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://collected.jcu.edu/cmll-facpub Part of the Latin American Languages and Societies Commons Recommended Citation Thornton, Megan, "Negotiating Nicaraguan Identity in Costa Rica: The performance of Affect in Desde el barro al sur" (2016). Classical and Modern Languages and Literatures. 4. https://collected.jcu.edu/cmll-facpub/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Carroll Collected. It has been accepted for inclusion in Classical and Modern Languages and Literatures by an authorized administrator of Carroll Collected. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 10 Negotiating Nicaraguan Identity in Costa Rica: The Performance of Affect in · Desde el barro al sur Megan Thornton John Carroll University As is the case with marginalized groups in other countries, the Nicaraguan "other" is often blamed for Costa Rica's socio­ economic problems. While tensions between the two countries are not new, pressures have mounted since the early 1990s due to increased migrations, economic crises, and political problems. Costa Rican historian Patricia Alvarenga explains that the increased presence of Nicaraguans in Costa Rica, particularly undocumented ones, at the turn of the millennium has brought a fear of "invasion" that threatens "la seguridad laboral e incluso el espacio vital de los costarricenses" ("Los migrantes"). This perceived threat highlights the complex emotions that surface with the topic of global migrations and also brings to the forefront issues of belonging in Costa Rica and Central America. Recent documentaries, such as Maureen Jimenez's Mas alla de las fronteras (1998), Maria Jose Alvarez and Martha Clarissa Hernandez's Desde el barro al sur (2002), Jurgen Urefia's De sol a sol (2005), Julia Fleming's NICA/ ragilense (2005), and Ishtar Yasin's La mesafeliz (2005), address the issue of Nicaraguans living and working in Costa Rica to draw attention to social prejudices and xenophobic attitudes. 1 Yasin also 11 Megan Thornton 12 13 directed the feature-length filmEl camino (2007), a road movie about a privileged position within Central America and much of Latin a brother and sister who leave home to search for their mother in America (Cortes, "La luz" 152). In La pantalla rota: Cien mfos de Costa Rica. This flurry of filmic activity dealing with Nicaraguan cine en Centroamerica, Maria Lourdes Cortes writes that the 1990s migration to Costa Rica merits scholarly attention, and Desde el brought new social themes like migration, ecology, and the role of barro al sur will be analyzed here since it is the only Nicaraguan women to the forefront with the documentary as "el genera id6neo production of those mentioned. para abordar estas tematicas de fin de siglo" (401). Filmmakers The focus of this essay is the performance and negotiation Alvarez and Hernandez have emerged as two of Central America's of affect, or emotion, in Desde el barro al sur. It was one of the most prominent documentarians, and much of their work, earlier films to deal with such a provocative and complex issue including Desde el barro al sur, has focused on the experiences of with (im)migrants portraying a range of emotions from fear and women and ethnic minorities.4 In a 2002 interview with La Prensa, loneliness to disappointment and joy. The film also takes a Nicaragua's socially conservative newspaper and oppositional voice critical look at both countries without laying blame and, since to the government, Alvarez states, "Nos llama la atenci6n el rol que its debut in 2002, has been shown in both countries to promote las mujeres estan jugando. Gran parte de las amas de casa de la cross-cultural understanding. In May 2008, filmmaker Martha Nicaragua desempleada, toman las riendas en Costa Rica. Pero esto Clarissa Hernandez explained the film's purpose by stating, "Muy, sucede por la necesidad" (Ruiz Baldelomar). Therefore, by focusing muy, muy, muy a prop6sito no queriamos hacer algo que fuera on. the experiences of a diverse group of Nicaraguan women and victimizante ni culpabilizante" (Personal Interview).2 With this goal their families instead of representing the more stereotypical male in mind, Desde el barro al sur uses music, contrasting images, and (im)migrant worker, Desde el barro al sur offers viewers a unique personal testimonies to explore differentaspects of the immigration perspective and an often silenced point of view within (im)migrant. debate in Costa Rica. During 57 minutes, the film reveals the networks. individual motivations and desires of each interviewee, including A documentary's audiovisual content, mode of (im)migrant workers and employers in Costa Rica as well as families representation, and stylized production, including the roles of left behind in Nicaragua. By· alternating between the neighboring the "actors," can be characterized as a performance that actively countries, Desde el barro al sur represents the experiences and engages the public. For example, the interviewees who tell their feelings of those who leave home, primarily women, and those who personal stories in Desde el barro al sur are still reenacting their stay behind. The film thus offers a counter-image and a counter­ lives for the camera. They relive their experiences in order to discourse to the more stereotypical representations of Nicaraguan narrate them and also reconnect with the feelings and emotions (im)migrants as uneducated, racialized criminals who abuse Costa associated with their (im)migrant journeys. This act of retelling Rica's resources. It also allows (im)migrants to deconstruct such aligns with .Richard Schechner's definition of performance as misrepresentations through alternative performances of affect, "r.estored behavior" or "twice-behaved behavior" (36). While this thereby redirecting the Costa Rican gaze to foster mutual respect performance. does not take away from the genuine and heartfelt and compassion. A review of spectator responses at the end of my emotions that interviewees express, it does speak to the reflexive essay reveals the affective impact of this documentary in its ability and revisionary nature of the retelling. As Schechner writes, "Put to facilitate the imagining of more accepting communities that are in personal terms, restored behavior is 'me behaving as if I am transnational in nature. By stirring up certain thoughts, feelings, someone else' or 'as if I am 'beside myself,' or 'not myself,' as when and emotions for both participants and viewers, Desde el barro al in trance" (37). For our purposes here, this. symbolic distancing sur can therefore draw diverse actors and audiences into new ways allows an interviewee, who may be seen as an actor, to recount of imagining community, citizenship, and belonging. a traumatic ordeal or to ,express a deep loss, experiences that Since the 1970s, a cinema with social preoccupations has many Nicaraguans may have encountered in Costa Rica. Thus, the flourished in Central America, aligning both thematically and documentary's distinctive features, showcasing oral testimonies stylistically with the New Latin American Cinema Movement.3 and personal accounts, make it a particularly apt genre both for Because at the turn of the millennium state resources are tight enacting and talking about feelings, leading to a performance of and film budgets primarily rely on private funding, feature-length affect. films are rarely produced, so the documentary genre occupies 14 Megan Thornton 15 The notion of affect, which connotes the experience of language-focused discrimination, for marking a language or feeling or having emotions, provides a pivotal point of entry into accent as inferior disempowers individuals and takes away their the (lm)migrant experience. Emotions serve to negotiate one's voice. Thus, when describing "nica-tico" interactions, accents and social surroundings and interpersonal relationships, and thus are appearances7 are markers of cultural differencethat highlight race key for an experience like (im)migration, w;hich can be gratifying and power relations and also social scripts of belonging in Costa and disorienting, challenging and unnerving as one constantly Rica and Central America. encounters new faces, cultures, languages, and traditions. While .When dealing with scripts of accepted behavior, emotions emotions are often described as internal processes, they are become a strategic tool. In "Feeling Brown" Jose Esteban Munoz, also social constructions and dynamic processes that vary with drawing on Sartre's Sketch fora Theoryof Emotions, definesemotions societal norms (Ehn and Lofgren 114). Such norms correspond as "the active negotiations of people withintheir social and historical to majoritarian scripts of accepted behavior, including the "right" matrix" (71). He further explains that emotions are a "performed look, dress, speech, and feelings,as dictated by formalinstitutions, manifestation of consciousness" and that this performanceenables dominant social groups, and cultural paradigms (115). In general, us to cope with life's highs and lows and' also mediate "different (im)migrant workers who look and speak differentlythan those with cultural logics of normativity" (71-2). Munoz's understanding of power tend to be cast as "illegal" outsiders
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