Venezuelan Literature

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irina Troconis
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
Literary Identity ◽  
Political Events ◽  
International Publishing ◽  
Publishing Houses ◽  
Hugo Chavez ◽  
Venezuelan Literature

This article presents an overview of some of the most representative and influential writers and works from Venezuela in the genre of novel, poetry, short story, and essay, from the 19th to the 21st century. Although Venezuela has a rich literary culture and critically acclaimed authors—such as Rómulo Gallegos, Arturo Uslar Pietri, and Miguel Otero Silva—whose works have become Latin American classics, the country’s literature has remained for the most part underread and understudied outside its frontiers. The reasons for this relative invisibility have been the focus of many debates among intellectuals both inside and outside Venezuela, who have pointed—not without criticism—to the writers’ almost exclusive reliance on national publishing houses, the impossibility of a recognizable literary identity, and the lack of noteworthy innovation as some of the reasons behind it. Nevertheless, since the mid-1990s, a renewed interest in Venezuelan literature has become palpable; international publishing houses have awarded prestigious awards to works by Venezuelan authors (Alberto Barrera Tyszka’s novel Patria o muerte was the winner of the XI Premio Tusquets Editores de Novela, and Rafael Cadenas’s extensive poetic work won him in 2016 the Premio Internacional de Poesía Federico García Lorca, to mention but a few), several new anthologies have been published, and symposiums and conferences drawing scholars from all over the world have been organized on the topic by prestigious international universities and organizations. This has partly been due to the political events that have taken place in the country since the arrival to power of Hugo Chávez, which have made Venezuela—and thus the literature written there—a “hot topic” among academic circles, both national and international. Furthermore, recent waves of emigration have brought Venezuelan authors to many universities abroad, where they have given the country’s literature more exposure, in many cases with the help of social media and other online platforms. In light of these events, this article offers a chronology of Venezuelan literature as a whole rather than constructing a separate chronology for each genre, and thus serves as an introduction to the authors and works that critics consider fundamental in the evolution of the country’s literary history. While theater has been excluded from this selection, two references have been included that give an overview of Venezuela’s abundant theatrical production and the important role it has played in shaping the country’s cultural and political identity.

Publishing from the periphery: Structural heterogeneity and segmented circuits. The evaluation of scientific publications for tenure in Argentina’s CONICET

2014 ◽  
Vol 62 (5) ◽  
pp. 743-765 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fernanda Beigel
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Structural Heterogeneity ◽  
Academic Publishing ◽  
Structural Constraints ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Thomson Reuters ◽  
The World ◽  
International Publishing ◽  
Publishing Houses ◽  
Scientific System

Academic publishing is one of the most unequal areas of the circulation of ideas. Recent studies have analyzed the dominance of ISI-style standards and its consequences for scientific production in the periphery. This article delves into the Latin American publishing circuit and its performance in the midst of four different types of circuits in the world academic system: (a) mainstream ‘international’ publishing circuits, sustained by major private enterprises and publishing houses (Thomson Reuters, Elsevier, Google); (b) transnational networks and repositories built as open access (DOAJ, Dial-net, INASP) to create an alternative to previous (c) regional Southern circuits (LATINDEX, SCIELO, CLACSO, REDALYC, AJOL); and (d) national circuits based on local publications. Given that these four circuits all come into play in national scientific fields, this article addresses the case of Argentina in order to prove that these circuits are segmented, partly due to the hierarchies of the World Scientific System and partly to structural constraints and the local history of professionalization. Focusing on tenure evaluations for research positions at Argentina’s National Scientific Research Council (CONICET), the article examines the results of a survey among coordinators of the council’s evaluation committees in order to analyze the relationship between international publishing and tenure. By exploring the evaluative culture at CONICET, common trends are highlighted along with alternative forms of regional academic prestige.

Forming Provisional Identities

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer J. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Contemporary Fiction ◽  
Short Story Cycle ◽  
Literary Responses ◽  
American Literary History ◽  
Story Cycle ◽  
Narrative Techniques

The introduction argues that the short story cycle is the preeminent genre for articulating the uncertainty that characterizes literary responses to modernity. The introduction outlines two vital contributions of the cycle to American literary history: 1. the absence of textual harmony in the cycle initiated new, pervasive narrative techniques of proliferating perspectives and disrupting chronology that inflect modern and contemporary fiction and 2. the form of the cycle enables the expression of subjectivity without fixity. Contingency and multiplicity are so central to our social-media infused culture that provisionality is its defining characteristic, but this book shows that the seeds for this go back almost to the nation’s founding.

Crumbling into Dust

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Levi Barnard
Keyword(s):  
Short Story ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Richard Wright ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Unfinished Business ◽  
Black Newspapers ◽  
American Literary History ◽  
Antebellum Period ◽  
David Walker ◽  
Historical Times

This chapter situates Chesnutt’s writing within a tradition of black classicism as political engagement and historical critique extending from the antebellum period to the twentieth century and beyond. Reading Chesnutt as a figure at the crossroads of multiple historical times and cultural forms, the chapter examines his manipulation of multiple mythic traditions into a cohesive and unsettling vision of history as unfinished business. In the novel The Marrow of Tradition and the late short story “The Marked Tree,” Chesnutt echoes a nineteenth-century tradition that included David Walker, Henry Highland Garnet, and writers and editors for antebellum black newspapers, while at the same time anticipating a later anti-imperial discourse generated by writers such as Richard Wright and Toni Morrison. Chesnutt provides a fulcrum for a collective African American literary history that has emerged as a prophetic counterpoint to the prevailing historical consciousness in America.

scholarly journals Editors' welcome, PORTAL, Vol 7, No 2, July 2010

1970 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Allatson
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Japanese Literature ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Editorial Committee ◽  
Racial Boundaries ◽  
Memory Work ◽  
American Immigrant

This issue of PORTAL Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies comprises five articles in its general essays section, and two works in its creative works section. We are delighted with the inclusion of the first three essays: “‘A Bit of a Grope’: Gender, Sex and Racial Boundaries in Transitional East Timor,” by Roslyn Appleby; “Undermining the Occupation: Women Coalminers in 1940s Japan,” by Matthew Allen; and “Pan-pan Girls: Humiliating Liberation in Postwar Japanese Literature,” by Rumi Sakamoto. These essays were presented in earlier formats at the two-day workshop, “Gender and occupations and interventions in the Asia Pacific, 1945-2009,” held in December 2009 at the
Centre for Asia Pacific Social Transformation Studies (CAPSTRANS), University of Wollongong. The workshop was convened by Christine de Matos, a research fellow at CAPSTRANS, and Rowena Ward, a Lecturer in Japanese at the Language Centre, in the Faculty of Arts, University of Wollongong. The editorial committee at Portal is particularly grateful to Christine and Rowena for facilitating the inclusion of these essays in this issue of the journal. Augmenting those studies is “Outcaste by Choice: Re-Genderings in a Short Story by Oka Rusmini,” an essay by Harry Aveling, the renowned Australian translator and scholar of Indonesian literature, which provides fascinating insights into the intertextual references, historical contexts and caste-conflicts explored by one of Indonesia’s most important Balinese authors. Liliana Edith Correa’s “El lugar de la memoria: Where Memory Lies,” is an evocative exploration of the newly emergent Latin(o) American identifications in Australia as constructed through self-conscious memory work among, and by, a range of Latin American immigrant artists and writers. We are equally pleased to conclude the issue with two text/image works by the Vancouver-based Canadian poet Derek Symons. Paul Allatson, Editor, PORTAL Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies.

scholarly journals Populism Revived:Donald Trump and the Latin American Leftist Populists

2018 ◽  
Vol 75 (4) ◽  
pp. 733-753 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos de la Torre
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Political Community ◽  
First Century ◽  
European Politics ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
American Democracy ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
Hugo Chavez ◽  
Juan Peron

The twenty-first century could well become known as the populist century. No longer confined to Latin America or to the margins of European politics, populism has spread to Africa, Asia, and, with Donald Trump's election, to the cradle of liberal democracy. Even though it is uncertain what impact Trump's populism will have on American democracy, it is worth learning from Latin America, where populists have been in power from the 1930s and 1940s to the present. Even as Latin American populists like Juan Perón and Hugo Chávez included the poor and the nonwhite in the political community, they moved toward authoritarianism by undermining democracy from within. Are the foundations of American democracy and the institutions of civil society strong enough to resist US president Donald Trump's right-wing populism?

scholarly journals Three Waves of Populism in Latin America

2014 ◽  
pp. 153-160
Author(s):  
O. V. Varentsova
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Import Substitution ◽  
Third Wave ◽  
Political Regimes ◽  
Political Transitions ◽  
Playing Field ◽  
The Third ◽  
Neoliberal Reforms ◽  
Hugo Chavez

Contemporary political regimes in Venezuela and Bolivia led by late Hugo Châvez (now by his successor Nicolas Maduro) and Evo Morales are considered by foreign and Russian scholars as part of the third wave of populism. In the 20th century Latin America already witnessed two waves of populism which coincided with significant political transitions, namely a transition from oligarchy to mass politics accompanied by implementation of import substitution industrialization policies, and a transition from authoritarian rule to democracy during the third wave of democratization which triggered neoliberal reforms inspired by Washington Consensus. This article presents common characteristics of Latin American populist regimes that emerged in different historical periods which help identify the origins as well as distinctive features of Venezuelan and Bolivian political regimes. It is stated that the Châvez and Morales left populist regimes resemble classic populist regimes in that they rely on incendiary anti-establishment discourse. Therefore, left populist regimes are characterized by high levels of polarization as well as weak institutionalization and class or indigenous orientation. Election of left populist leaders may lead to institutional deadlock, uneven playing field and transition to competitive authoritarianism.

The Latin American Publishing Circuit in the 21st Century: Following the Trajectory of César Aira

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 056-064
Author(s):  
María Belén Riveiro ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
American Literature ◽  
Latin American ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Latin American Literature ◽  
Publishing Houses ◽  
César Aira ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Cesar Aira ◽  
The 1960S

This essay poses a question about the identity of Latin American literature in the 21st century. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Latin America Boom received recognition both locally and internationally, becoming the dominant means of defining Latin American literature up to the present. This essay explores new ways to understand this notion of Latin America in the literary scene. The case of the Argentine writer César Aira is relevant for analyzing alternative publishing circuits that connect various points of the region. These publishing houses foster a defiant way of establishing the value of literature.

The Latin American Short Story: An Annotated Guide to Anthologies and Criticism

1993 ◽  
Vol 67 (3) ◽  
pp. 593
Author(s):  
Melvin S. Arrington ◽  
Daniel Balderston
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Annotated Guide

Literary History of Bengal, 8th-19th century AD

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thibaut d'Hubert
Keyword(s):  
South Asia ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Political Transitions ◽  
Literary Identity ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Narrative Forms ◽  
Literary Practices ◽  
The 19Th Century

The literary history of Bengal is characterized by a multilingual ecology that nurtured the development of Middle Bengali literature. It is around the turn of the second millennium, during the Pāla period (c. 8th–12th century), that eastern South Asia became a major region for the production of literary texts in Sanskrit and Apabhramsha. Early on, Bengal developed a distinct literary identity within the Sanskrit tradition and, despite abrupt political transitions and the fragmentation of the landscape of literary patronage, fundamental aspects of the literary culture of Pāla Bengal were transmitted during later periods. It was during the Sultanate period, from the 14th century onward that courtly milieus began to cultivate Middle Bengali. This patronage was mostly provided by upper-caste Hindu dignitaries and (in the case of lyric poetry at least) by the Sultans themselves. During the period ranging from the 15th to the early 19th centuries, vernacular literature can be divided into two broad categories: short narrative forms called padas or gītas (songs), which were often composed in an idiom derived from songs by the Old Maithili poet Vidyāpati (c. 1370–1460); and long narrative forms in Middle Bengali called pā̃cālīs, which are characterized by the alternation of the prosodic forms called paẏār and tripadī and the occasional insertion of songs. These poetic forms are the principal markers of the literary identity of Bengal and eastern South Asia (including Assam, Orissa, and Arakan). The Ḥusayn Shāhī period (1433–1486) contributed to the consolidation and expansion eastward of vernacular literary practices. Then, the political landscape became fragmented, and the multiplication of centers of literary production occurred. This fragmentation fostered the formation of new, locally grounded literary trends. These could involve the cultivation of specific genres, the propounding of various religious doctrines and ritual practices, the fashioning of new idioms fostered by either dialectal resources, classical idioms such as Sanskrit or Persian, and other vernacular poetic traditions (Maithili, Avadhi, Hindustani). The late Mughal and early colonial periods witnessed the making of new trends, characterized by a radical modification of the lexical component of the Middle Bengali idiom (i.e., Dobhāṣī), or the recourse to scripts other than Bengali (e.g., Sylhet Nagari/Kaithi, Arabic). The making of such new trends often implied changes in the way that authors interacted with Sanskrit, Persian, and other vernacular traditions. For instance, Persian played as crucial a role as Sanskrit in the various trajectories that Middle Bengali poetry took. On the one hand, Persian in Bengal had a history distinct from that of Bengali; on the other hand, it constituted a major traditional model for Bengali authors and, at times, Persianate education replaced the one based on Sanskrit as the default way to access literacy. Even if Middle Bengali poetic forms continued to be used in the context of various traditional performances, the making of a new literary language in the 19th century, the adoption of Western genres, and the development of prose and Western prosodic forms occasioned a radical break with premodern literary practices. From the second half of the 19th century, with the notable exception of some ritual and sectarian texts, access to the ancient literature of Bengal began to be mediated by philological analysis and textual criticism.

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