Description
Book SynopsisA key participant in all the major debates in Latin American studies - beginning with the "boom" period of the 1960s and continuing through debates on ideology and discourse, Marxism, mass culture, and postmodernism - the author is recognised for her feminist critique of Latin American writing. This book offers a selection of her essays.
Trade Review“A formidable compendium of Franco’s critical thought, attesting to the evolution of a brilliant avant-garde intellectual who has set the pace for serious inquiry in the Latin American field as we know it today.
Critical Passions is not simply a tribute to Franco but an urgent recounting of the progression of a field of study that she has helped shape.”—Francine Masiello, author of
Between Civilization and Barbarism: Women, Nation, and Literary Culture in Modern Argentina“Pratt and Newman have done the critical readership an immense service by collecting these far-flung essays by one of our foremost critics. This learned feminist touches upon issues of history and identity, of cultural politics and the study of globality, from a political perspective that remains resolutely focused on social justice.”—Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, author of
A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present“The essays collected in this volume reflect the range, innovativeness, theoretical clarity, and analytical power that have made Jean Franco’s work a beacon of light in the study of Latin American culture.”—Susan Kirkpatrick, author of
Las Romanticas: Women Writers and Subjectivity in SpainTable of ContentsAcknowledgments vii
Introduction: The Committed Critic / Mary Louise Pratt and Kathleen Newman 1
1 Feminism and the Critique of Authoritarianism 9
2 Mass and Popular Culture 133
3 Latin American Literature: The Boom and Beyond 233
4 Mexico 429
Afterword: The Twighlight of the Vanguard and the Rise of Criticism (1994-1995) 503
Biographical Note 517
Index 519
