The dramaturgy written by Cuban American, Puerto Rican, and Dominican American women propels Hispanic-Caribbean theater beyond the geographical borders of their islands, thus creating and nurturing, transnational cultural enclaves that support it while also transforming the cultural theatrical environment of the United States. This dramaturgy, with its themes and arguments, puts into practice the feminist and LGBTQ critical theories with a focus on minority groups in US society. This work analyzes Hispanic-Caribbean theater traditions from their origins to the transformations they undergo in the United States given the influence of the various Caribbean diasporas. The essential characteristics of this drama, written by women, lead to the creation of a new theater characterized by its hybrid and bilingual roots. This dramatic cultural transformation reveals the diversity and inclusion of ethnic, racial, sexual identities, and the myriad intersectionalities found in the diasporic island communities from which it takes flight. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (PhD)--Florida Atlantic University, 2021. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

The Colombian armed conflict has affected Colombia’s civil population of all walks of life and has been a long-term problem. Within these, the most affected are people from the rural areas, minorities such as women, adolescents, children, and the indigenous communities. This work analyses the literary representation of trauma and the internal displacement in Colombia in Los ejércitos (2007) by Evelio Rosero. The introduction provides historical context and definitions of trauma. The analysis of the impact of trauma on the collective and the minorities follows. For theoretical and historical references, this thesis draws concepts mostly from psychoanalysis, Irene Visser’s modified Grid Theory of social thought, and official Colombian documents. The thesis examines how the structure of Los ejércitos and some of its characters provide the representation of trauma in relation to the armed conflict in Colombia and the internal displacement that ensued. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2020. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

This dissertation studies on the representation of internal immigrants in Peruvian fiction and film of the last three decades. I analyze two novels, Cronwell Jara's Montacerdos (Lima, 1981), and Julio Ortega's Adiós, Ayacucho (Lima, 1986), and the award-winning film La teta asustada (Perú-Spain, 2009) by Claudia Llosa. These works deal with the conflicting relationship between Lima, as both the site of a rational order and the locus of modernization, and the immigrant subject, and the strategies the latter uses for settling in the city and grasping its cultural codes. The first chapter examines the representation of the so-called "ciudad letrada" ("lettered city") in Cronwell Jara's Montacerdos as an obstacle for the newly-arrived illiterate internal immigrants in their fruitless efforts to become "citizens". I analyze the much debated relationship between orality and literacy as it is represented in the novel, centering on the ways in which the immigrant's narrative voice appropriates and deterritorializes the city's writing system by relocating the rural "Other" within the urban landscape. The second chapter studies Julio Ortega's Adiós, Ayacucho, one of the earliest literary works denouncing the political violence unleashed by the civil war that pitted subversive armed movements against the Peruvian state from 1980 through 1992. Given that the protagonist is a victim of forced "disappearance", I focus on the figure of the "disappeared" as well as on the development of political violence in general, and how the two subjects are fictionalized in the novel. I argue that the protagonist's dead body serves as a metaphor for the concept of memory but also for that of the Peruvian nation and its history of conquest and colonial domination. This chapter also examines the novel's critique of the role of the intellectual in representing the 'subaltern' subject. The third chapter centers on Claudia Llosa's La teta asustada and draws on psychoanalytical and film theory in order to analyze the film's depiction of violence against women during the civil war. I examine the director in her filmic account of a woman's process of adaptation to the city. This woman is emblematic of the intense drama suffered by internally displaced persons in Perú. In this chapter I take a Lacanian perspective to analyze the voice as an object of enjoyment and observe its subsequent fetishization. I argue that the voice works as a metaphor for the relationship that the main character establishes with the city, and with the economic system that governs it.

This thesis proposes the samba enredo, a complex narrative composed by Rio de Janeiro samba schools for the annual Carnaval parade, as a vital primary source for understanding the construction of Afro-Brazilian identity in contemporary Brazilian society. Next, I provide an analysis of one specific samba enredo presented by the samba school Unidos da Vila Isabel in the 2012 Rio Carnaval, which portrays the cultural link between Angola and Brazil. I argue that the narrative Vila Isabel constructs is a thoughtful, albeit incomplete, alternative to the more common link drawn between Yoruba culture and Afro-Brazil. Furthermore, I ascertain that this samba enredo, and the academic sources used to compose it, lack a clear definition of the religious dimension of Angolan heritage in Afro-Brazilian culture because they place Central African conversions to Catholicism in the context of slavery and do not cite the impact that Catholicism makes in Angola before the context of slavery and the Diaspora encounter in colonial Brazil.

No description available.

This dissertation focuses on how history is made meaningful in the present. I argue that within the United States and Brazil, historic narratives and sites are employed in legitimizing and contesting past and contemporary social inequity. National, regional, and local narratives tell the stories of how communities and their members came to be who and where they are in the present. Social hierarchies and inequity are naturalized and/or questioned through historic narratives. Formative education includes telling these stories to children. Commemorative events and monuments tell and re-tell stories to community members of all ages. Enculturation of historical identities, the positioning of self within historic trajectories that connect the past to the present, occurs throughout one's lifetime, developing and shaping one's sense of self. How are members of multicultural, former slaveholding nations, such as the United States and Brazil, taught to see themselves in relationship to the history of slavery? Is this past meaningful in daily life? How are historic sites and figures representing the history of slavery and resistance made meaningful to people in terms of personal, local, and national histories? What pasts are made relevant to whom and for whom? Do ideas of race inform narratives of the past? If so, how and toward what end? Analysis is focused on community action and discussions surrounding two historic cemeteries where the remains of enslaved Africans were interred in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: the Richmond African Burial Ground, in Virginia and the Cemiterio dos Pretos Novas in Rio de Janeiro. Upon each site a revolutionary figure is memorialized -- Gabriel in Virginia and Zumbi dos Palmares in Rio de Janeiro.

This dissertation analyzes the impact of European liberalism on the process of nation-building in Mexico. In particular, it studies the role of liberalism in the shaping of Mexican thought concerning national identity. It accomplishes this by examining the essayistic production of four major Mexican intellectuals: José María Luis Mora (1794-1850), Gabino Barreda (1818-1881), José Vasconcelos (1882-1959), and Carlos Monsiváis (1938-2010). This dissertation aims to explore how a program deeply rooted in European culture and thought such as liberalism shaped these intellectuals’ interpretations of Mexican culture. The dissertation will also highlight how their work coincided with their pursuit of a governmental system based on liberal principles, along with the urgent need to build a sense of national identity. The first chapter delineates a historical and conceptual framework by borrowing key ideas and definitions of liberal doctrine. Likewise, the chapter traces and contextualizes Mora’s contributions to liberal thought in Mexico during the early stages of Mexico’s independence. The second chapter centers on two periods in Mexican history: the Porfiriato (1876-1910) and the aftermath of the Mexican Revolution (1911-1921). It focuses on Porfirian views of liberal education, and on the role of the post-revolutionary state in guaranteeing social and economic progress after decades of civil and military unrest. For this purpose, the chapter studies Gabino Barreda's positivist approach to education and Jose Vasconcelos’ views on the role of the state in shaping a national post-revolutionary culture based on the figure of the mestizo: a multiracial, multicultural, national symbol. The third chapter analyzes Carlos Monsiváis' retrospective reading of liberalism in the context of the downfall of the PRI. It shows why Monsiváis rescues the legacy of Jacobin liberalism in an era of globalized neoliberalism. This chapter shows in which ways Monsiváis engages with liberalism to address the question of “lo mexicano.” The conclusion of this dissertation revisits the main ideas deployed in the three chapters and assesses the limits of liberalism to articulate the problem of national identity during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Esta investigación examina cuatro novelas latinoamericanas de las últimas dos décadas del siglo XX con el fin de demostrar la forma en que establecen evidencia textual y contextual que valida su inclusión bajo la categoría de textos literarios eróticos y su exclusión de los "infiernos" eróticos. / Spanish

Undocumented migrants are a part of our daily lives, yet we rarely hear their stories or know who they really are; the word "undocumented" can have a negative connotation both within and outside the Latinx community and is often associated with criminals and various other negative stereotypes. This study aims to understand how identity is affected by documentation status and how that affects the undocumented and documented Latinx community, the experiences of Latinx people of different documentation status with connections to illegal immigration, and how they navigate through those experiences in the United States of America knowing that they are putting themselves at risk. There is not enough representation of undocumented Latinx people and their role in society; it is important to understand the undocumented Latinx community and give them a voice because undocumented people are one of the U.S.' backbones in cultural and socio-economic terms. This investigation will provide more insight into their experiences and the identity struggle within the Latinx context through a series of interviews and an in-depth literature review of other publications sharing undocumented Latinx individuals' oral histories. It aims to shine a positive light on the community and contribute to future research on similar topics.

No description available.