Este ensayo propone un análisis deconstructivo del problema del habla y la escritura en Vidas secas (1938) de Graciliano Ramos. Al examinar la razón de la aparente discapacidad lingüístico-alfabética de los protagonistas de la obra, la crítica ha permanecido hasta el momento dentro de un esquema oposicional (habla/no-habla) que debería ser reevaluado por fuera de ese mismo esquema. Siguiendo las ideas de Jacques Derrida, el artículo considera a Fabiano y a su familia una suerte de filósofos que, en su divagar mental y físico, realizan una crítica onto-teológica y logocéntrica del sistema de diferencias metafísicas naturaleza/cultura y humanidad/animalidad. A la luz de las teorías de Giorgio Agamben, Fabiano representa igualmente al homo sacer, en tanto proscrito bajo estado de excepción en donde se anula la diferencia entre animalidad y humanidad. Como subalterno, el personaje se ubica en un espacio liminal, incluido por su misma exclusión.

El boxeo mexicano ha generado una larga tradición literaria y gráfica que ha sido poco estudiada. Este ensayo analiza las crónicas “La última gigantomaquia,” de José Juan Tablada, “Las glorias del gran Púas,” de Ricardo Garibay, y “La hora del consumo de los orgullos,” de Carlos Monsiváis. En ellas el boxeo sirve como espacio donde se representan y resuelven simbólicamente tensiones políticas y sociales, nacionales y transnacionales. Además, como industria deportiva el boxeo es el espacio en donde se experimentaron las prácticas y condiciones a las que se enfrentará el deportista profesional dentro del capitalismo global. Por otra parte, debido a la violencia que conlleva, el boxeo ha sido el espacio donde se representa la masculinidad moderna. Las tres crónicas que conforman este ensayo crean un arco temporal que recorre el siglo XX mexicano y muestran la relación del deporte con el periodismo, la política y el mercado global.

Arequipa durante la Colonia se constituyó en uno de los ejes del intercambio de la región sur y alto peruana, la cuál se caracterizó por haber logrado un alto nivel autosustentado de producción agropecuaria. La emergencia de Arequipa se puede relacionar a un número de razones que lindan con la ubicación geográfica y sus características ecológicas, las características demográficas y sociales de su población, los recursos naturales disponibles, el tipo de producción agraria, la capacidad constructora urbana y la habilidad del “chacarero” arequipeño en el manejo del terreno agrícola, la existencia de grupos urbanos dinámicos vinculados a grupos extranjeros y de poder en el país, el tamaño de la ciudad y su desarrollo coherente al de la Campiña aledaña. Evidentemente unas y otras se superponen implícitamente. La ciudad tuvo un papel preponderante en la articulación de una micro-región que incluyó la Campiña, estrechamente interrelacionado a ella, los valles de la costa y otros interandinos para los cuales Arequipa se constituyó en el centro de mercadeo y servicios, de residencia y apoyo, que cubre desde lo financiero y cultural hasta lo relativo a las amenidades de la vida social.

Report presented at the meeting of the Executive Council of the Latin American Studies Association (online session), May 22–23, 2020.

This essay reviews the following works:

The Civil Sphere in Latin America. Edited by Jeffery C. Alexander and Carlo Tognato. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Pp xvi + 261. $99.99 hardcover. ISBN: 9781108426831.

Youth Power in Precarious Times: Reimagining Civic Participation. By Melissa Brough. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2020. Pp x + 206. $24.95 paperback. ISBN: 9781478008071.

The New Latin America. By Fernando Calderón and Manuel Castells. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2020. Pp xx + 250. $26.95 paperback. ISBN: 9781509540020.

The Volatility Curse: Exogenous Shocks and Representation in Resource-Rich Democracies. By Daniela Campello and Cesar Zucco. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp xx + 239. $39.99 paperback. ISBN: 9781108795357.

Memorias de nuestra democracia: Los 40 años del 10 de Octubre. By Colectivo Fogoneros. La Paz: Editorial 3600, 2022. Pp. 275. paperback. ISBN: 9789917612292.

Neoliberalism from Below: Popular Pragmatics and Baroque Economies. By Verónica Gago. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2017. Pp. 277. $26.95 paperback. ISBN: 9780822369127.

Social Movements in Latin America: Mapping the Mosaic. By Ronaldo Munck. Newcastle upon Tyne: Agenda Publishing, 2020. Pp xvi + 175. $39.95 paperback. ISBN: 9781788212434.

Another Aesthetics is Possible: Arts of Rebellion in the Fourth World War. By Jennifer Ponce de León. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2021. Pp xii + 315. $104.95 paper. ISBN: 9781478011255.

Ephemeral Histories: Public Art, Politics, and the Struggle for the Streets in Chile. By Camilo D. Trumper. Oakland: University of California Press, 2016. Pp. xiv + 276. $29.95 paperback. ISBN: 9780520289918.

Barring the outbreak of internecine conflict in Central America, the greatest challenge to the Nicaraguan Revolution lies in rural Nicaragua. As in most developing countries, the severest poverty in Nicaragua has always been found in the rural areas. Somewhat paradoxically, however, the rural areas of the country are also the source of the nation's wealth: 90 percent of the foreign exchange, so necessary to a small state like Nicaragua, is derived from agriculture. Moreover, around 70 percent of the population earn their living from the land. Consequently, meeting the promises of the revolution depends crucially on the performance of the agricultural sector.

The recent return of peace to El Salvador is providing increasingly favorable conditions for scholarly research. This encouraging climate will help Salvadoran and guest researchers make up for years of difficult and repressive conditions. Some researchers may begin by examining contemporary questions related to the recent revolutionary process, but historical research should also be greatly facilitated. Entrepreneurial searches for archival materials on the period preceding the mid-twentieth century can be surprisingly successful when one combines a national outlook with careful regional probing. This research note will provide a guide to archival and other historical materials available in the United States and El Salvador and will place these sources in the context of major questions left unanswered by the historiography covering 1700 to 1940.

It requires a lot of temerity to analyze in a few pages such a great and complicated topic as “The Study of Latin American History Today,” especially if one is not Richard Morse. My only vantage point is a rather varied experience. A European historian, I am an autodidact in things Latin American. Since the late 1940s, I have visited and done some research in most of the countries of Latin America, and Spain. I have had the privilege of teaching Latin American history at five major United States universities during a total of five and a half years. At the present time I find myself once again in Europe. Thus I am familiar with the increased European interest in Latin American studies during recent years as well as with the various factors which still hamper us in our job. From the psychological point of view I have probably become a kind of mestizo, a Swedish-Latin-North American blend. Though at ease in any of three environments, I have the feeling of being to some extent an outsider even in the country of my birth. After this presentation-confession I shall first survey the current situation in broad terms. The second point will be to discuss the purpose of the study of Latin American history and finally, to recommend some norms of policy.

This essay reviews the following works:

Worldly Philosopher: The Odyssey of Albert O. Hirschman. ByJeremy Adelman. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2013. Pp. xv + 740. $39.95 cloth. ISBN: 9780691155678.

Kalman Silvert: Engaging Latin America, Building Democracy. Edited byAbraham F. Lowenthal andMartin Weinstein. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2016. Pp. vii + 195. $24.50 paper. ISBN: 9781626375550.

Disciplinary Conquest: U.S. Scholars in South America, 1900–1945. ByRicardo D. Salvatore.Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016. Pp. xii + 329. $94.95 cloth. $26.95 paper. ISBN: 9780822360957.

¿Cómo se transforman las universidades latinoamericanas en el contexto del capitalismo académico? Exploramos esta pregunta desde una perspectiva sociológica, que enfatiza el papel de actores locales en la configuración de procesos de cambio social. A partir de una revisión sistemática de artículos periodísticos y de sesenta y seis entrevistas a expertos, docentes y autoridades universitarias, analizamos las dinámicas del sistema universitario peruano desde los orígenes de la reforma de 2014 hasta su crisis en 2023. Basándonos en el trabajo de Pierre Bourdieu, sostenemos que el capitalismo académico no es un fenómeno homogéneo ni inevitable, sino que sus lógicas dependen de negociaciones entre actores involucrados en el campo de la educación superior. En el contexto peruano, se observa un modelo rentista, que privilegia el lucro en el corto plazo, basado en cómo propietarios de universidades, rectores y académicos negocian y adaptan las exigencias de la reforma.

Our purpose is to evaluate the impact of the economic and social policies of Chile's military junta on the well-being of the majority of chilenos, especially those of the lowest income level. The exercise consists of a simple comparison of income and expenditure levels between those of the last months of the Unidad Popular (UP) government and those of October 1974. We have chosen the 1968–69 average as a basis of comparison for two reasons. First, in practical terms, the Dirección de Estadística y Censos (DEC) conducted a survey on consumption expenditures for different income groups for that period, and it is the most recent one available. Second, in the days prior to the coup there was general agreement among economists, both in the government and in the opposition, that the average standards of living were equivalent to those of 1968–69. In effect, according to the Taller de Coyuntura, real wages during the first eight months of 1973 were 98.8 percent of their levels in January 1970. Since this index of real wages is based on January 1970, and our basis of comparison is 1968–69, we can assert that in the last months of the Unidad Popular government (January-August 1973) real wages were at least equal to, if not higher than, those of 1968–69. We should emphasize that the Taller de Coyuntura was a vocal stronghold of forces opposed to the government of Salvador Allende. In addition, a comparison of the Consumers' Price Index, published by the Banco Central de Chile, indicates that real wages increased between 1970 and July 1973. A somewhat more favorable picture would have come out of studies conducted at the now defunct Instituto de Economía Política y Planificación (Facultad de Economía Política, Universidad de Chile), which indicated that between July and August 1973, real wages were back to their September 1970 level. The gains of the first two years of the Unidad Popular—especially for the lowest income groups—had been lost due to government mistakes and as a result of the sabotage and destabilization campaigns that started 5 September 1970 and culminated with the bloody coup of 11 September 1973. Hence even though we are using 1968–69 as a proxy, we are actually comparing real income in October 1974 with that of the final months of the government of the Unidad Popular.

The present trend toward democratic regimes in Latin American countries raises the issue of their regime-determined capabilities. Democracy is generally defined in procedural terms and supported on moral rather than policy grounds (Schumpeter 1950, 242). Consequently, very little is known about the policy consequences, if any, of the adoption of democratic forms and procedures by Latin American political systems. One way to examine this question is to analyze the policy performance of the three democratic regimes in Latin America that are the most institutionalized: Colombia, Costa Rica, and Venezuela. These three nations, unlike Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Uruguay, were able to withstand the authoritarian trends of the 1960s and early 1970s. They have been democratic long enough (well over two decades) during a period when development issues were salient to indicate the policy-performance capabilities of democratic regimes operating within the cultural, economic, and political context of Latin America.

The Fundación John Boulton was established in 1950 as a privately funded institution sponsored by the Casas Boulton of Caracas, Valencia, and Maracaibo. For many years, the Fundación functioned in the Villa Espalmador in El Paraíso, but it has recently moved to new quarters in Torre El Chorro, Avenida Universidad, in the center of Caracas. Founded to facilitate research on the history and culture of Venezuela, the Fundación has assembled a strong collection covering the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Moreover, the collection is constantly being augmented by purchases, exchanges, and donations of additional material. The material available in the Fundación is found in the library, in the various archives, and in two museums.