On Latinidad

Abstract

This book addresses the question of how Latino/Latina literature wrestles with the panethnic and trans-racial implications of the “Latino” label. Refusing to take latinidad (Latino-ness) for granted, the book lays the groundwork for a sophisticated understanding of the various manifestations of Latino identity. It examines texts by prominent Chicano/Chicana, Dominican American, Puerto Rican, and Cuban American writers—including Julia Alvarez, Cristina García, Achy Obejas, Piri Thomas, and Ana Castillo—and concludes that a pre-existing group does not exist. The book instead argues that much recent Latino/Latina literature presents a vision of tentative, forged solidarities in the service of particular and sometimes even local struggles. It shows that even magical realism can figure as a threat to collectivity, rather than as a signifier of it, because magical connections—to nature, between characters, and to Latin American origins—can undermine efforts at solidarity and empowerment. In the book's reading of both fictional and cultural narratives, the possibility that Latino identity may be even more elastic than the authors may recognize is suggested.

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