Off the Beaten Path: Revolution and Travel in Memoirs by Three Latin American Women Authors

Authors

  • Liliana Guadalupe Chávez Díaz Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15174/rv.v13i27.547

Abstract

This paper reflects on memoirs and travel writing by Latin American women authors. It intends to add to the discussion regarding memory and self-representation within the field of Latin American literature that has been publishing since 2000, by focusing on female first-person travel accounts about guerrillas and revolutions during the 1960s. The aim is to trace the particular uses of language that women writers have developed in Latin America to represent themselves while traveling on their own, across a continent in under development and facing great social challenges. The main focus is on The Country Under My Skyn: A memoir of love and war (El país bajo mi piel, 2001), by Gioconda Belli; Dancing with Cuba(La Habana en un espejo, 2004), by Alma Guillermoprieto; and Viajes: De la Amazonía a las Malvinas (2014), by Beatriz Sarlo. I propose to shed light on Latin American nonfiction and lesser-known female authors, studying travel literature as a means of individual and collective expression of memory. The paper offers a female perspective on ideology, politics, and travel while raising awareness of class and gender representations in contemporary literature.

Author Biography

Liliana Guadalupe Chávez Díaz, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana

Doctora en Español (Ph.D. Spanish, University of Cambridge). Se especializa en narrativa latinoamericana de los siglos XX y XXI. Su principal línea de investigación son los géneros de no ficción en español, particularmente la relación entre periodismo y literatura, así como la literatura de viajes de mujeres. De 2018 a 2020 fue investigadora en estancia posdoctoral Conacyt, adscrita al programa de Maestría en Literatura Mexicana Contemporánea de la Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana – Unidad Azcapotzalco, donde impartió cursos sobre periodismo literario, literatura en medios de comunicación y escritura creativa. Actualmente es profesora asociada del Departamento de Sociología de la misma institución. Ha sido académica visitante en Columbia University en E.U.A., en la Universidad de Buenos Aires y la Fundación Tomás Eloy Martínez en Argentina, así como en el Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut en Alemania. También ha sido becaria de la Fundación Carolina en España y la Fundación para un Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano en Colombia. Recientemente ha publicado artículos en Textos Híbridos, Lingüística y Literatura y América, así como capítulos en los libros Literary Journalism and Latin American Wars (Université de Lorraine, 2020), The Limits of the Human in Latin American Culture (University of Florida, 2020) y Migration, Indigenity and Trauma (Routledge 2020), entre otros. Como periodista, ha publicado en medios de comunicación como El Universal, Milenio, Sinembargo.mx y Nexos. En 2021 la editorial Bloomsbury Academic publicará su tesis doctoral con el título Latin American Documentary Narratives: The Intersections of Storytelling and Journalism in Contemporary Literature.

 

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Published

2020-11-05

How to Cite

Chávez Díaz, L. G. (2020). Off the Beaten Path: Revolution and Travel in Memoirs by Three Latin American Women Authors. Valenciana, 13(27), 7–34. https://doi.org/10.15174/rv.v13i27.547

Issue

No. 27 (2021): Núm. 27 enero-junio 2021

Section

Artículos

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