Lazaro Lima - The Latino Body: Crisis Identities in American Literary and Cultural Memory

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The Latino Body: Crisis Identities in American Literary and Cultural Memory
Lzaro Lima

New York and London

www.nyupress.org

2007 by New York University
All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lima, Lzaro.

The Latino body : crisis identities in American literary and cultural memory / Lzaro Lima.

p. cm. (Sexual cultures : new directions from the Center for

Lesbian and Gay Studies)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-8147-5214-2 (alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 0-8147-5214-4 (alk. paper)

ISBN-13: 978-0-8147-5215-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 0-8147-5215-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. American literatureMexican American authorsHistory and
criticism. 2. Mexican AmericansEthnic identity. 3. Mexican AmericansHistoriography. 4. Mexican Americans in literature.
5. Chicano movement. 6. Mexican American literature (Spanish)
History and criticism. I. Title.

PS153.M4L54 2007
810.986872dc22 2007006121

New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper,
and their binding materials are chosen for strength and durability.

Manufactured in the United States of America

c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

p 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The body of this book and the material body that produced it were both nurtured and supported by many people and institutions. I take great pleasure in acknowledging them here. The genesis of this book was conceived at the University of Maryland, College Park, where Sandra Messinger Cypess, Regina Harrison, Phyllis Peres, Simon Richter, and Sal Sosnowski were early supporters, generous readers, and exemplary academic role models. At Maryland I was also fortunate to come in contact with scholar-teachers who provoked and reeducated me about the uses of Amrica, national belonging, and cultural memory in invaluable ways: Karen Christian, Peter Hulme, Linda Kaufmann, Jos Emilio Pacheco, Ineke Phaf, Jos Rabasa, and Beatriz Sarlo all fostered the intellectual climate that allowed me to engage the fields of American studies and Latin American literatures in ways that traditional disciplinary boundaries would have otherwise prevented.

I received important feedback on various incarnations of this book from the audiences at numerous conferences of the American Studies Association, the Latin American Studies Association, and the Modern Language Association and from invitations I received from colleagues to present my work at various institutions. I thank Shiva Balaghi at New York University, Zilkia Janer at Hofstra University, Luis Rebaza-Soraluz at Kings College, University of London, and Jennifer Spear at the University of California, Berkeley, for helping make these particular engagements so rewarding and the company so gratifying. I also received useful feedback from the editors of the Wallace Stevens Journal, where an earlier portion of first appeared, and I thank them for permission to reprint. The assistance of the librarians and staff of the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, facilitated much of the archival work necessary to complete this book, and I especially thank Susan Snyder for securing permissions and meeting my requests with efficiency. The staff of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University, the National Archives and Records Administration, the Van Pelt Library at the University of Pennsylvania, and the Canaday Library at Bryn Mawr College were resourceful and unfailingly helpful with my varied inquiries and requests. Institutional and financial support came at various stages of the project from the University of Maryland, the Penn Humanities Forum at the University of Pennsylvania, and Bryn Mawr College. At Bryn Mawr, I am grateful to Provost Ralph Kuncl for providing invaluable assistance, generous support, and thoughtful advice. I also wish to thank Director of Sponsored Research Nona Smith for facilitating travel funding to several research collections. At New York University Press, I thank Jos Esteban Muoz and Ann Pellegrini, editors of the Sexual Cultures series, for supporting this project. Also at NYU Press, I have been fortunate to count on the enthusiastic support and intelligence of Eric Zinner, editorial director, as well as the remarkable efficiency of Emily Park, and Despina Papazoglou Gimbel.