File spoon-archives/postcolonial.archive/postcolonial_1998/postcolonial.9804, message 112


Date: Tue, 7 Apr 1998 08:56:38 -0600 (MDT)
From: leslie anne lopez <llopez-AT-unm.edu>
Subject: Re: Query 1


Ok, despite my weird status vis a vis this list (I don't study fiction as
a career, but anthropology) and the non-response my posts have evoked in
the past, I can't resist here.

For more on "Is Latin America postcolonial" please see Jorge Klor de
Alva's recent work on the topic.  Sorry I don't have any biblio info on
it.  Anyway, he argues that Latin America does not fit the "postcolonial" 
mold, because of its national independence movement in the 19th, not 20th
century, and because its history of genocide and mestizaje before
independence has largely avoided the colonial tithe--which for him is a
central defining characteristic of colonialism.  I disagree with him, and
tend more towards the opinion expressed at the end of Judith Tabron's post
in which she says something like, if "postcolonial" doesn't describe these
intertwined histories of domination, then maybe we need a new
adjective/discipline.  

Klor de Alva's (he's an anthropologist at Berkeley) assessment seems to me
particularly odd in view of the fact that his area of study has been
Mexican history at the time of the conquest.  Clearly, the Aztec empire
was based economically and politically on a tithing system levied on
subordinated peoples.  And, although creole nationalism has tended to
return to state-capitol tithing as opposed to European crown tithing, the
two systems have always been "articulated," as Laclau might say.  As a
socialist representative in Chile remarked in 1992, describing the
panoptic dynamics of Allende-imposed "mayors" in rural towns, "power has
been so close--and yet so external..."  And the same groups of people
continue to pay, and pay and pay.  One of the zapatistas' resounding
phrases is "...and our so-called leaders continue to demonstrate a
vocation for the foreign..." 

Clearly, the significance of relatively recent national independences is
not to be underestimated, but I echo those who have argued that these
studies cannot be allowed to marginalize contemporary neocolonialism,
national-level oppression of "citizens," and decolonization movements--
whether in recently nationalized places, or those who have longer
histories of national appropriation.

Leslie Lopez

On Mon, 6 Apr 1998, Andrew Libby wrote:

> 
> What is the relation of studies of literatures, politics, histories,
> cultures of Spanish- and indigenous-speaking areas of the Caribbean and
> Central and South America and Mexico to postcolonial studies? Must an area
> (or literature, or political or cultural domain have won independence
> within the last 30-40 years to qualify as an object of postcolonial
> interest? What does an area have to have done, or gone through, and when,
> to gain the status of postcolonial? Why do many Spanish-speaking
> countries/areas seem to be ignored in this context? Would Cuba count as
> poco-worthy, while Mexico wouldn't? Is there still colonialism of a kind
> in, say, Peru? Does independence from only certain colonizing powers make
> a given area an object of postcolonial interst? Are the boundaries
> linguistic, geographical, or ideological?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>      --- from list postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
> 



     --- from list postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005