Women in Contemporary Latin American Novels: Psychoanalysis and Gendered Violence (Literatures of the Americas)

This book explores the relationship between psychoanalysis, literary criticism and contemporary literature. Focusing on Latin America, and using examples from Brazilian, Colombian, Chilean, Puerto Rican, and Mexican literature, it provides an important account of why gendered violence occurs and how it is portrayed. In the novels discussed, the protagonists express similar fears, passions and illnesses that are present in contemporary Latin America. Psychoanalysis and literary criticism offer us an interpretative framework to understand these voices, especially those that are in the margin. Women, particularly, as part of a globalized labor force, express through their bodies social problems that range from the erotic use of the body in a hypersexualized world, to the body as a receptacle of violence that expresses the death drive. This book is a fascinating contribution to literary, gender, and cultural studies. Front Matter ....Pages i-x Introduction: Liminal Females in Contemporary Latin-American Novels (Beatriz L. Botero)....Pages 1-17 Literature as Ghost Whisperer in 2666: Narrating the Impossible (Chris T. Schulenburg)....Pages 19-42 Retelling La charca: Osario de Vivos, Women, and Con/Textual Aggressions in Puerto Rican Literature (Nancy Bird-Soto)....Pages 43-60 Gender, Space, and the Violence of the Everyday in Parque Industrial (Melissa Eden Gormley)....Pages 61-77 Mother, Nation, and Self: Poetics of Death and Subjectivity in Julián Herbert’s Canción de Tumba (Raúl C. Verduzco)....Pages 79-109 The Body in Rosario Tijeras: Between the Life and Death Drives (Eros and Thanatos) (Beatriz L. Botero)....Pages 111-134 Back Matter ....Pages 135-148 Annotation Examining the relationship between psychoanalysis, literary criticism and contemporary literature, this book focuses on examples from Latin America in order to provide an important account of why gendered violence occurs and how it is portrayed. In the novels discussed, the protagonists express similar fears, passions and illnesses that are present in contemporary Latin America. Psychoanalysis and literary criticism offers us an interpretative framework to understand these voices, especially those that are in the margin