Browsing by Author "Fernandez, Sylvia Arlene"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1

Genealogía transfronteriza: (Re)interpretaciones literarias de identidades femeninas en Cd. Juárez-El Paso
(2019-12) Fernandez, Sylvia Arlene; Sisk, Christina L.; Soliño, María Elena; Fairclough, Marta A.; De Los Reyes, Guillermo; Bejarano, Cynthia L.
Transfronteriza Genealogy: Literary (Re)interpretations of Female Identities in Cd. Juárez-El Paso is a dissertation that questions and dismantles stereotypical images (e.g., violence) and hegemonic discourses, (e.g., patriarchal, misogynistic, racist) about the Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico-El Paso, Texas, United States border and its women in order to bring to the forefront other realities of this borderland region and its inhabitants. This analysis of literary works by women writers who are native to this region, creates a transfronteriza genealogy that highlights the multiple and complex identities, intersectionalities, and subjectivities of borderland women during the XX and XXI centuries. In addition, it illustrates how women’s agency showcases strategies of survival, resilience, and resistance in the face of various modes of violence and forms of oppression on either or both sides of the border. In this first chapter, I analyze poetry by Natalie Scenters-Zapico, in her collections, The Verging Cities and Lima :: Limón, as well as Amalia Ortiz’s Rant.Chant.Chisme. and The Canción Cannibal Cabaret & Other Songs. In this chapter, the author’s intersectional identities as U.S. borderland women illustrate how they both reflect and question, on personal, collective, and literary levels, (in)visible violence related to gender, feminicide, and “the border crisis” (i.e., immigration). In chapter two, I study Adriana Candia’s chronicles in Mujeres eternas: Crónicas de Adriana as well as stories by Alicia Gaspar de Alba in The Mystery of Survival and Other Stories. Through this analysis, I discuss the identities of multiple female personalities who identify as (in)migrants, fronterizas (from the Mexico/U.S. border), and transfronterizas (crossing from Mexico to U.S. and vice versa), in order to trace the development and deployment of survival strategies in the face of various types of cultural violence. In chapter three, I analyze stories by Arminé Arjona, in her collection, Delincuentos: Historias del narcotráfico, as well as Elpidia García Delgado’s Ellos no saben si soy o no soy. In this chapter, I focus on how through the identities of the female personalities as fronterizas (from the Mexico border) and transfronterizas (crossing from Mexico to the U.S.), they confront, resist, and defy structural violence and oppression within the drug trade and the maquiladora industry. In this way, this study presents a transfronteriza, transfeminist and collective consciousness, developed through a personal, political, literary, and academic orientation, that responds to and fosters critical thought regarding misogynistic and racist violence on the Mexico-U.S. borderland.