University of Arizona Press Primitivism and Identity in Latin America: Essays on Art, Literature, and Culture

Although primitivism has received renewed attention in recent years, studies linking it with Latin America have been rare. This volume examines primitivism and its implications for contemporary debates on Latin American culture, literature, and arts, showing how Latin American subjects employ a Western construct to "return the gaze" of the outside world and redefine themselves in relation to modernity. Examining such subjects as Julio Cortazar and Frida Kahlo and such topics as folk art and cinema, the volume brings together for the first time the views of scholars who are currently engaging the task of cultural studies from the standpoint of primitivism. These varied contributions include analyses of Latin American art in relation to social issues, popular culture, and official cultural policy; essays in cultural criticism touching on ethnic identity, racial politics, women's issues, and conflictive modernity; and analytical studies of primitivism's impact on narrative theory and practice, film, theater, and poetry. This collection contributes offers a new perspective on a variety of significant debates in Latin American cultural studies and shows that the term primitive does not apply to these cultures as much as to our understanding of them. CONTENTS-Paradise Subverted: The Invention of the Mexican Character / Roger Bartra-Between Sade and the Savage: Octavio Paz's Aztecs / Amaryll Chanady-Under the Shadow of God: Roots of Primitivism in Early Colonial Mexico / Delia Annunziata Cosentino-Of Alebrijes and Ocumichos: Some Myths about Folk Art and Mexican Identity / Eli Bartra-Primitive Borders: Cultural Identity and Ethnic Cleansing in the Dominican Republic / Fernando Valerio-Holguin-Dialectics of Archaism and Modernity: Technique and Primitivism in Angel Rama's Transculturacion narrativa en America Latina / Jose Eduardo Gonzalez-Narrative Primitivism: Theory and Practice in Latin America / Erik Camayd-Freixas-Narrating the Other: Julio Cortazar's "Axolotl" as Ethnographic Allegory / R. Lane Kauffmann-Jungle Fever: Primitivism in Environmentalism; Romulo Gallegos's Canaima and the Romance of the Jungle / Jorge Marcone-Primitivism and Cultural Production: Future's Memory; Native Peoples? Voices in Latin American Society / Ivete Lara Camargos Walty-Primitive Bodies in Latin American Cinema: Nicolas Echevarria's Cabeza de Vaca / Luis Fernando Restrepo-Subliminal Body: Shamanism, Ancient Theater, and Ethnodrama / Gabriel Weisz-Primitivist Construction of Identity in the Work of Frida Kahlo / Wendy B. Faris-Mi andina y dulce Rita: Women, Indigenism, and the Avant-Garde in Cesar Vallejo / Tace Megan Hedrick-