16 Jewish-Mexican Literatures: Ashkenazic Tradition and Culture
Abstract
The focus of this article is on the specificity of Ashkenazic-Mexican literature written in Spanish. It shows how it emerged in the 1970s, authored by second and third generation immigrants and how it focused on challenging the up to then homogenizing national discourse and featured commentaries on Jewish and global topics, claiming ethnic but also gender plurality. The article traces different phases of Ashkenazi-Mexican literature: in the 1970s and 1980s that part of Mexican society obtained literary visibility for the first time, often in fictional texts narrated in third-person singular. In the 1990s, this was followed by autobiographical explorations - mostly by female authors - of hybridity and hyphenated identity in the 1990s with particular emphasis on female empowerment and the challenging of patriarchal hierarchies. The article also deals with topics of migration to Mexico and (post-traumatic) memory as entangled history and the dynamics between remembering and oblivion. To put it in a nutshell: Ashkenazi-Mexican authors, such as Margo Glantz, Sabina Berman, and Gloria Gervitz, do no longer figure as representatives of a peripheral, marginal literature, but are in the center of a Mexican literature now conceived as one full of linguistic and literary cosmopolitism beyond national boundaries.
Abstract
The focus of this article is on the specificity of Ashkenazic-Mexican literature written in Spanish. It shows how it emerged in the 1970s, authored by second and third generation immigrants and how it focused on challenging the up to then homogenizing national discourse and featured commentaries on Jewish and global topics, claiming ethnic but also gender plurality. The article traces different phases of Ashkenazi-Mexican literature: in the 1970s and 1980s that part of Mexican society obtained literary visibility for the first time, often in fictional texts narrated in third-person singular. In the 1990s, this was followed by autobiographical explorations - mostly by female authors - of hybridity and hyphenated identity in the 1990s with particular emphasis on female empowerment and the challenging of patriarchal hierarchies. The article also deals with topics of migration to Mexico and (post-traumatic) memory as entangled history and the dynamics between remembering and oblivion. To put it in a nutshell: Ashkenazi-Mexican authors, such as Margo Glantz, Sabina Berman, and Gloria Gervitz, do no longer figure as representatives of a peripheral, marginal literature, but are in the center of a Mexican literature now conceived as one full of linguistic and literary cosmopolitism beyond national boundaries.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction 1
-
I Medieval Constellations
- 1 Jewish and Converso History in Medieval Spain: The Castilian Case 15
- 2 The Poetry of Sefarad: Secular and Liturgical Hebrew Verse in Medieval Iberia 39
- 3 The kharadjāt 55
- 4 Jews and Conversos in Spanish Cancioneros and Portuguese Cancioneiros (c. 1350–1520) 81
-
II Early Modern Contexts
- 5 1492–1700: Early Modern Iberian-Jewish Cultural History 155
- 6 Converso Spectres: The Lessons and Challenges of Spanish ‘Golden Age’ Prose 185
- 7 From the Iberian Peninsula into the World: Leone Ebreo’s Dialoghi d’amore and the ‘Occidental’ Concept of Love 221
- 8 The Literature of the Western Sephardim 251
- 9 Jews in the History and Culture of the Caribbean 297
-
III The Eighteenth and the Nineteenth Centuries
- 10 The Iberian Diasporas in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries 317
- 11 Conversos in Colonial Hispanic America 353
-
IV The Twentieth Century
- 12 The Twentieth Century in Iberian and Latin American History 373
- 13 Contemporary Jewish Literatures of Spain 417
- 14 Mapping Twentieth Century Sephardic Literature 433
- 15 Jewish-Brazilian Literatures 447
- 16 Jewish-Mexican Literatures: Ashkenazic Tradition and Culture 475
- 17 Sephardic Writing in Mexico 523
- 18 Jewish Literatures from the Rio de la Plata Region (Twentieth Century) 547
-
V Contemporary Contexts
- 19 Historiography and Literary Essays on Latin American Jews in the New Millennium 579
- 20 Contemporary Jewish Narrative in Twentyfirst Century Latin America 603
- 21 Writing Cuban Belonging through Jewish Eyes 627
- Index 645
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction 1
-
I Medieval Constellations
- 1 Jewish and Converso History in Medieval Spain: The Castilian Case 15
- 2 The Poetry of Sefarad: Secular and Liturgical Hebrew Verse in Medieval Iberia 39
- 3 The kharadjāt 55
- 4 Jews and Conversos in Spanish Cancioneros and Portuguese Cancioneiros (c. 1350–1520) 81
-
II Early Modern Contexts
- 5 1492–1700: Early Modern Iberian-Jewish Cultural History 155
- 6 Converso Spectres: The Lessons and Challenges of Spanish ‘Golden Age’ Prose 185
- 7 From the Iberian Peninsula into the World: Leone Ebreo’s Dialoghi d’amore and the ‘Occidental’ Concept of Love 221
- 8 The Literature of the Western Sephardim 251
- 9 Jews in the History and Culture of the Caribbean 297
-
III The Eighteenth and the Nineteenth Centuries
- 10 The Iberian Diasporas in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries 317
- 11 Conversos in Colonial Hispanic America 353
-
IV The Twentieth Century
- 12 The Twentieth Century in Iberian and Latin American History 373
- 13 Contemporary Jewish Literatures of Spain 417
- 14 Mapping Twentieth Century Sephardic Literature 433
- 15 Jewish-Brazilian Literatures 447
- 16 Jewish-Mexican Literatures: Ashkenazic Tradition and Culture 475
- 17 Sephardic Writing in Mexico 523
- 18 Jewish Literatures from the Rio de la Plata Region (Twentieth Century) 547
-
V Contemporary Contexts
- 19 Historiography and Literary Essays on Latin American Jews in the New Millennium 579
- 20 Contemporary Jewish Narrative in Twentyfirst Century Latin America 603
- 21 Writing Cuban Belonging through Jewish Eyes 627
- Index 645
