<p> This dissertation examines the literary representations and interpretations of La Matanza, a Salvadoran massacre that occurred in 1932. A peasant-led uprising resulted in the assassination of thousands of campesinos and indigenous people by General Maximiliano Hern&aacute;ndez Mart&iacute;nez's repressive military regime. As a result of government repression and censorship, the events surrounding La Matanza were intentionally omitted from Salvadoran history for many decades. Despite these censorship efforts, writers like Roque Dalton, Claribel Alegr&iacute;a, Salarru&eacute; and Manlio Argueta defied authoritarian government repression and incorporated the events of La Matanza into their writing. The literary texts that this dissertation analyzes are: Salarru&eacute;'s "Mi respuesta a los patriotas" (1932), "El espantajo," (1954), Dalton's Miguel M&aacute;rmol: Los sucesos de 1932 en El Salvador (1971), "Todos," "Viejuemierda," "Hechos, cosas y hombres de 1932," Alegr&iacute;a's Cenizas de Izalco (1966) and Argueta's Un d&iacute;a en la vida (1980) and Cuzcatl&aacute;n donde bate la mar del sur (1986). </p><p> These authors exemplify multiple and often conflicting perspectives concerning the massacre. Each of them offers a unique interpretation of this event, emphasizing issues such as class, identity, gender and race, among others. However, all of them share the attempt to use literature as a vehicle to lend a voice to populations that did not have a place in official historical accounts. This study draws upon subaltern, postcolonial, feminist and other theories, in order to highlight the particular position of each author. Moreover, in this dissertation I argue that, the colonial, racist and patriarchal discourse that was used to justify the massacre was also used to justify the atrocities of the civil war in the 1980s. In addition, this analysis emphasizes the links between the peasant resistance of the 1930s and that of the 1980s. Furthermore, this dissertation stresses the importance of remembering El Salvador's complex history of violence in order to better understand the post-war era.</p>

<p> Junot Diaz employs a variety of postmodernist literary strategies in <i> The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,</i> such as conflating (and confusing) the role (and identity) of author and narrator, creating a parallel fictional (and semi-fictional) subtext in the form of numerous, often detailed footnotes, and incorporating a hybrid mixture of discourses throughout a self-referential, apparently self-undermining narrative. Yet by means of his persistent satirical tone, pervasive irony, occasional explicit commentary, and thematic inferences, Diaz simultaneously challenges the core tenets of postmodernist-poststructuralist theory. Diaz's creative concerns interrogate the notion of constructed histories, reestablish distinctions within binaries, and defy the poststructuralist prohibition against grand narratives, while contesting the postmodernist tendency toward moral and cultural relativism. Diaz appears to be consciously inviting a poststructuralist reading, even as he simultaneously undermines any possibility for such a theoretical analysis ever succeeding in fully coming to terms with his work. In effect, Diaz redirects the lens of the postmodernist-poststructuralist perspective back on itself, questioning its basic assumptions. Diaz creates a unique, innovative literary language in <i>The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, </i> borrowing tropes from Dominican folklore and popular superstition, mixing in idioms and memes from sci-fi, horror, fantasy, Japanese animes and North American movies, television serials, comic books, hip-hop, and urban diction, in order to tell a story that reawakens repressed memories of historical trauma, and enhances awareness of egregious contemporary injustice. Diaz focuses on the devastating trajectory of the imperialist enterprise in the Western hemisphere since 1492, highlighting the rapacious ideology that ruthlessly engenders this ongoing project of exploitation, domination, and oppression. In setting private aggrandizement above collective wellbeing, the imperial mentality causes incalculable, completely unnecessary suffering, beginning with genocide against the native population, and extending into the extreme social disparities of the neoliberal present; the predatory practices of this avaricious agenda have become so destructive that they now threaten the very survival of the human species. Ruthless greed is the curse that afflicts us; the only possible counter spell that can save us will be a courageous return to instinctive solidarity, with timely recourse to the healing power of human love.</p>

The aim of this doctoral thesis is to explore the way in which political violence during the time of the Shining Path guerrilla movement has been represented in contemporary Peruvian fiction and to examine the role of the female figure in the articulation of the collective memory. As the thesis will show, the use of female characters as a means of expressing the trauma of Peru as a nation is relatively recent and is limited in particular to the first decade of the twenty-first century. In this sense, the reassessment of the role of women in the conflict is inseparable from the important contribution made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, whose final report, published in 2003, contributed decisively to reassessing the participation of women in the organizational structure of the Shining Path and in bringing to light the testimonies of Peruvian women who were victims of violence at the hands of both the Shining Path and the Peruvian Army. In addressing this topic, my research focuses on the analysis of three novels: La hora azul (2005), by Alonso Cueto; Confesiones de Tamara Fiol (2009), by Miguel Gutiérrez; and Radio Ciudad Perdida (2007), by Daniel Alarcón. These novels are among the most widely read and critically acclaimed works in Peruvian literature in dealing with the period, and they also share the fact of having been written by male authors. Although there are also works on this period written by women, what I argue in this thesis is that the reassessment of the female figure and its relationship with violence in Peruvian fiction has been dominated, in practice, by a male perspective which, although it attempts to recover the silenced voice of women, nevertheless continues to interpret it with reference to what are considered to be essentially female stereotypes. / L'objectif de cette thèse de doctorat est d'explorer la forme par laquelle la violence politique de l'époque du mouvement de guérilla Sentier lumineux est représentée dans la narrative péruvienne contemporaine, ainsi que le rôle de la figure féminine dans l'articulation de la mémoire collective. Comme se montre dans ces pages, l'utilisation de personnages féminins comme moyen d'exprimer le trauma du Pérou en tant que nation est relativement récente et se limite surtout à la première décennie du XXIe siècle. Dans ce sens, la réévaluation du rôle de la femme dans le conflit n'est pas séparable de la contribution importante faite par la Commission de la Vérité et de la Réconciliation, dont le rapport final publié en 2003 a contribué de manière décisive à réévaluer la participation des femmes dans la structure organisationnelle du Sentier lumineux et à mettre en lumière les témoignages de femmes péruviennes qui ont été victimes de la violence autant par le Sentier lumineux que par l'Armée péruvienne. En abordant ce thème, cette recherche se centre sur l'analyse de trois romans: La hora azul (2005), de Alonso Cueto; Confesiones de Tamara Fiol (2009), de Miguel Gutiérrez; et Radio Ciudad Perdida (2007), de Daniel Alarcón. Ces romans sont parmi ceux de majeure diffusion et résonance critique du pays, et ils présentent en plus le trait commun d'avoir été écrits par des auteurs masculins. Bien que des œuvres existent sur cette époque écrites par des femmes, ce que je soutiens dans cette thèse est que la réévaluation de la figure féminine et de sa relation avec la violence dans la narrative péruvienne a été une tâche dominée en pratique par un regard masculin qui, bien qu'il essaie de récupérer la voix étouffée de la femme, néanmoins continue de l'interpréter conforme aux stéréotypes considérés essentiellement féminins.

At the beginning of the 20th century, in Argentina, there was a marked increase in the number of women who dedicated themselves to writing professionally. This has resulted in women gradually acquiring a voice of their own and a distinct place in the national literary discourse. By the mid-1960s there was a noticeable tendency among several of these female authors to write and publish their autobiographies, thus contributing to the creation and recreation of alternative public self images, which were usually in marked contrast to the parameters tacitly established for female writing by the Argentine literary, cultural, and social elite. The purpose of this doctoral thesis is, therefore, to investigate the strategies of self-representation that these female Argentine authors, Victoria Ocampo, María Rosa Oliver, and Alicia Jurado, used in their texts to create their particular self image and expose their private life. Through their life narratives such authors began to break into the national corpus of autobiography and occupy a space hitherto rarely taken up by female writers. First, an overview of the consistent under-evaluation of both autobiography and female writing in literary studies in general, and in Argentina in particular, will be conducted. Then attention will centre on the autobiographical writings of Argentine female authors borne between the final decade of the nineteenth and the early years of the twentieth centuries. Finally, particular attention will be paid to the historic-cultural, literary, and feminist context of the times to which these autobiographies refer as well as the actual moment in which the texts were written and published. / On peut constater dès le début du XXe siècle en Argentine, une remarquable augmentation dans le nombre de femmes dédiées à l'écriture professionnelle qui leur permît de gagner graduellement une voix et un espace propres, dans la littérature nationale. Vers la moitié des années 60, on peut voir parmi beaucoup de ces femmes écrivaines une forte tendance à élaborer et publier leurs autobiographies, en contribuant de cette façon à créer et recréer une image féminine alternative et propre, normalement en dissonance avec les paramètres établis tacitement par le milieu social, culturel et littéraire argentin. Le but de cette dissertation doctorale est donc d'examiner les stratégies d'autoreprésentation que les écrivaines féminines argentines Victoria Ocampo, María Rosa Oliver et Alicia Jurado utilisent dans leurs textes à fin d'exposer leurs vies privées devant le lecteur et d'occuper avec leurs narratives de vie, l'espace rarement peuplé dans la littérature nationale de l'autobiographie écrite par des femmes argentines. À cette fin, ma recherche abordera l'analyse de la situation de dévaluation dans laquelle l'autobiographie et l'écriture féminines se sont trouvées pendant longtemps parmi la littérature et les études littéraires, en général, et parmi la littérature argentine, en particulier. Mon étude se focalisera sur la production autobiographique des écrivaines féminines argentines nées entre la dernière décennie du XIXe siècle et le début du XXe et dirigera une attention particulière au contexte du discours historique, culturel, littéraire et féministe de l'époque où ces narratives de vie s'insèrent, ainsi qu'au moment particulier dans lequel les textes sont produits et publiés.

ABSTRACTArgentina's film industry and feminist movement both emerged at the turn of the twentieth century and evolved side by side. However, from the 1900s to the 1970s, the number of women in front of the camera in Argentina far exceeded the mere three directing behind it: two female directors during the silent era (1901-1928), none throughout the Golden Age of Argentine cinema (1930-1950) and one in the 1960s. Not until the 1970s do feminism and film finally intersect in the figure of Argentine film director María Luisa Bemberg. A unique female perspective grounded in her feminist ideals distinguishes Bemberg from her predecessors. In her short, impressive career, Bemberg subverts stereotypical images of women in Argentine cinema to leave a legacy of female protagonists that embody a new model of 'woman' in film. This dissertation studies Bemberg's framing of women and their spatial movement in her historical biographies: Camila (1984), Miss Mary (1986) and Yo, la peor de todas (1990). Bemberg correlates her female protagonists' transgressive movements with their desire for independence. The director's female perspective exposes the political, social and cultural problems that continue to repress women and which each of her nonconforming protagonists, in her own way, is meant to reveal. This study makes an important contribution to existing scholarship on Argentine cinema in particular and to film studies in general since few studies exist that specifically explore women's movement framed through the cinematographic gaze of a female director.First, I delineate the histories of Argentine film and of the feminist movement before exploring women's roles in the film industry. Through a selection of Argentine 'Golden Age' films, I examine the female stereotypes and conventions of spatial movement to assess whether Bemberg breaks away aesthetically. Finally, I apply aspects of Giuliana Bruno's feminist film theory to analyze Bemberg's spatial framing of women in her biographical films. / SOMMAIREL'industrie cinématographique et le mouvement féministe en Argentine ont tous deux émergés au début du XXe siècle et ont évolué côte à côte. Toutefois, entre les années 1900 et les années 1970, il y avait beaucoup plus d'actrices que de réalisatrices dans le cinéma argentin: deux réalisatrices à l'époque du film muet (1901-1928), aucune pendant l'âge d'or du cinéma argentin (1930-1950) et une dans les années 1960. Ce n'est que dans les années 1970 que féminisme et cinéma se croisent finalement dans l'œuvre de la réalisatrice María Luisa Bemberg. Bemberg se distingue de ses prédécesseurs par sa perspective féminine unique soutenue par ses idéaux féministes. Au cours de sa courte et impressionnante carrière, Bemberg a renversé les images stéréotypées de la femme dans le cinéma argentin pour faire place à une lignée de protagonistes féminines qui incarnent un nouveau modèle de femmes dans le cinéma. Cette thèse étudie la représentation des femmes et leur mouvement spatial dans les biographies historiques de Bemberg: Camila (1984), Miss Mary (1986) et Yo, la peor de todas (1990). Dans ces films, Bemberg montre la relation ente les mouvements transgressifs de ses protagonistes féminins et leur désir d'indépendance. La perspective féminine et féministe de la réalisatrice révèle les enjeux et institutions politiques, sociaux et culturels qui ont opprimé les femmes et que ses protagonistes tentent de combattre afin de s'affirmer en tant qu'êtres pensants libres. La cartographie de la trajectoire spatiale des personnages féminins dans les films de Bemberg qui est élaborée dans cette thèse représente une contribution importante à la recherche sur le cinéma argentin ainsi qu'aux études cinématographiques féministes.La présente étude commence avec un survol de l´historie du cinéma et du mouvement féministe argentin. Elle explore para la suite le rôle des femmes et les stéréotypes féminins dans le cinéma argentin. Cette analyse me permettra de mieux dégager les caractéristiques de l'esthétique féministe de Bemberg. La théorie cinématographique féministe de Giuliana Bruno servira de cadre conceptuel à une analyse détaillée du cadrage spatial utilisé par Bemberg dans ses films biographiques.

This thesis proposes a reading of Justo Sierra O´Reilly´s La hija del judío as a regional foundational fiction that makes use of the Jewish Question to represent the colonial past of Yucatan. Here it is analyzed how the Jewish Question has been used in the national narratives of both Europe and Latin America, and the place that La hija del judío occupies among the Latin-American foundational fictions. At the same time, it is shown how Sierr a O´Reilly uses the Jewish Question to rewrite Yucatan´s history from a liberal perspective that seeks the construction of an independent Republic of Yucatan. The objective of this work is to contribute to the reappreciation of La hija del judío as one of the masterpieces of Mexican literature while promoting the study of the Jewish Question in the literature of Yucatan. / Cette thèse propose une lecture de La hija del judio de Justo Sierra O'Reilly comme une ficción fundacional qui utilise la question juive pour représenter le passé colonial du Yucatan. La thèse explore à la fois la façon dont la question juive a été utilisée dans les narratives nationales de l'Europe et de l'Amérique latine et la place que tient La hija del judio dans les ficciones fundacionales de l'Amérique latine. En partant d'une perspective libérale dont le but est la construction d'une république indépendante du Yucatan, cette thèse étudie de quelle manière Sierra O' Reilly utilise la question juive pour réécrire l'histoire du Yucatan. L'objectif de ce travail est de contribuer à la revalorisation du roman de Sierra O'Reilly comme un des chefs d'oeuvres de la littérature mexicaine et en même temps, de promouvoir l'étude de la question juive dans les lettres yucathèques.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-07, Section: A, page: 2963. Adviser: Joyce Tolliver. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 202-210) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Spanish and Portuguese, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Oct. 6, 2009). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-02, Section: A, page: 0577. Adviser: Gustavo Sainz.

The objective of this Master's thesis is to analyze how female characters are represented in the Argentinean Luisa Valenzuela's novels Novela negra con argentinos (1990) and La travesia (2001), and the way in which these characters, through the writing process, move forward in their awareness development and in the elaboration of a discourse that proposes an inversion to male domination. The introduction and theoretical framework explain both the objectives and the theoretical tools utilized throughout the thesis chapters: the first chapter develops the analysis of Novela negra con argentinos, emphasizing the concept of what the novel's main character calls writing with the body. An attempt is made to solve the questioning on whether it is possible to consider writing with the body within non-female aesthetics. The androgenisation process of Valenzuela's characters is also analyzed as a strategy that allows for questioning the roles that have traditionally been assigned to men and women. This strategy is also an attempt to bring closer two aesthetics that appear as conflicting in the text: the female discourse of writing with the body, and the male logocentric discourse. The second chapter focuses on the analysis of La travesia ; a novel that is considered as an adult Bildungsroman. This part shows how awareness through memory allows the main character to develop some strategies that make it possible for her to rebel against the patriarchal system. Such awareness becomes evident in the manner in which she begins to relate to men; as well as in finding a way of writing in which she has ceased to please the male Otherness that has alienated her for years. That way of writing gives her access to a new symbolic order in which gender relations appear more equitable. The last chapter presents the conclusions of this work on the Argentinean author who, through her essays and creative production, denounces the female oppression situation, as one of her structural central themes; as well as her proposals to promote liberation from such oppression.

This dissertation explores the rhetoric of childhood to comprehend how Latin American literature and film signify childhood. It furthermore analyzes the figure of the child as a rhetorical device in the construction of literary and cinematographic meaning in twentieth and twenty-first century poetry, narrative prose and film. I claim that, contrary to prevailing cultural notions of childhood innocence, the child often constitutes an unsettling presence, signaling textual as well as extradiegetic opacities and tensions. Echoes of the Child is divided into three chapters that each present a different approach to childhood. Chapter 1 posits the politicization of the child narrator’s voice as both enabling and restricting the articulation of socio-political trauma. Analyzing texts by Nellie Campobello, Rosario Castellanos, Juan Pablo Villalobos and Juan Rulfo, I contend that child narrators create and subvert meaning depending on the position they occupy vis-à-vis the socio-political turmoil they witness. The second chapter postulates an uneasy alliance between what I call the ‘visual pull’ of the child on screen, and the erotic charge of the image in three Argentine films by Lucrecia Martel, Julia Solomonoff and Federico León / Martín Rejtman. I probe the relationship between the child’s strong screen presence and the forms in which the cinematographic image offers the child ways of transforming sexuality into sensuality; resisting heteronormative sexuality; and of eluding the spell of the adult’s libidinal gaze. Performing when she is merely present, I argue that the child bestows a performative dimension on her acting and her very presence. The third and final chapter posits infancy as an impossible experience in poetry from the historical avant-garde by Oliverio Girondo, César Vallejo and Vicente Huidobro. I contend that reading the poetry guided by the infant reveals two sides of ‘experience;’ the poetic expression of the infant’s experience of the world, a question I broach through psychoanalysis, and the poet’s attempts at articulating transcendental experience in language. My analyses reveal how the rhetoric of childhood bears on issues and dynamics in the socio-political realm; it thus contributes to our understanding of processes of signification within Latin American culture. / Romance Languages and Literatures