Reframing Latin America: A Cultural Theory Reading ... - BGSU Blogs

152 reframing latin america
Specifi cally, Bary appeals to Brazilian essayist Angel Rama, Anglo-Irish
academic Benedict Anderson, and Cuban anthropologist Fernando Ortiz.
These authors introduced three theoretical concepts in the late 1970s
and early 1980s that Bary uses to reread Latin American identity. Respectively,
these concepts are the lettered citizen, imagined communities, and
transculturation.
We will not defi ne these three concepts at length, allowing Bary to do
so. Briefl y, Rama’s discussion of the lettered citizen introduces the idea
that people in positions of power possess a disproportionate ability to shape
public opinion, but that simply because they are in power does not mean
they hold the truth or that they are divorced from discursive infl uences any
more than are people out of power. Anderson’s notion of imagined communities
contends that nations are cultural constructs rather than ontological
essences. Ortiz’s argument about transculturation asserts that elites
and masses engage in a constant dialogue and that, despite the hegemonic
power of the elites, masses inject themselves and their values into the system.
Together, these three concepts allow for a different sort of textual analysis.
For example, when reading a text like Sarmiento’s Facundo or Martí’s
Our America we are encouraged to ask how authors construct Latin American
identity rather than to what extent they possess knowledge of its true
identity. Even if these three concepts do not mention discourse specifi cally,
they invite us to question the discursive infl uences that shape an author’s
thinking.
Armed with these three concepts, Bary asks, Whose voice is being represented
in the text? Who is speaking on behalf of whom? Which voices are
being excluded when the voice in the text is being heard? If an author purports
to speak on behalf of all of Latin America, who is still being left out?
Do authors’ particular views or arguments, even if they look egalitarian on
the surface, actually exclude a minority or even a majority of the population?
What is the discursive position of these authors? As you read, consider
Bary’s own words: “A key question is who directs the creation of culture
and the production of cultural identity.” 4
An excerpt from Walter Mignolo, an Argentine-born scholar now teaching
at Duke University, is also included in this chapter. Like Bary, Mignolo
approaches the question of Latin American identity from a semiotic perspective.
Rather than believing in the existence of a true and ontological
Latin America, Mignolo believes that identities come into existence during
the process of defi ning them. He advocates deconstructing identity claims
in order to expose them as constructs. We have chosen Mignolo for a very
specifi c reason: He gives voice to the so-called third way that typifi es the