Tropics of Desire: Interventions from Queer Latino America (Sexual Cultures)
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.18 (915 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0814769535 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 302 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2014-02-06 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
This luminous critical exercise is matched by the author's no less dazzling prose. Reading Quiroga's agile and powerful prose is itself one of the adventures offered here. His balancing act between deadly serious issues of identity and control and the fun and pride of maneuvering accentuates these spectacular accounts of lesbian and gay creativity in the dense social contexts of Latino lives."-Doris Sommer,Professor of Latin American Literature, Harvard University"A vivid analysis of how many Latin Americans have crafted alternative modes of understanding sexuality." -Hispanic American Historical Review"Incisive and witty, Quiroga's survey of the constructions of hom
From its sweaty beats to the pulsating music on the streets, Latin/o America is perceived in the United States as the land of heat, the toy store for Western sex. It is the territory of magical fantasy and of revolutionary threat, where topography is the travel guide of desire, directing imperial voyeurs to the exhibition of the flesh.Jose Quiroga flips the stereotype upside down: he shows how Latin/o American lesbians and gay men have consistently eschewed notions of sexual identity for a politics of intervention. In Tropics of Desire, Quiroga reads hesitant Mexican poets as sex-positive voices, he questions how outing and identity politics can fall prey to the manipulations of the state, and explores how invisibility has been used as a tactical tool in opposition to the universal imperative to come out.Drawing on diverse cultural examples such as the performance of bolero and salsa, film, literature, and correspondence, and influenced by masters like Roland Barthes, Walter Benjamin and a rich tradition of Latin American stylists, Quiroga argues for a politics that denies biological determinism and cannibalizes cultural stereotypes for the sake of political action.
Fast shipping; seamless transaction This was a very smooth transaction with fast shipping; I received the book in no time at all and in excellent condition.. Libro chevere on gay Latino culture! A Customer Too many gay Latin books focus on Spain, basically (though unintentionally) reinforcing the idea that homosexuality is a European phenomenon. To add salt to the wound, they focus upon ancient, obtuse Spanish writings rather than the cool cultural products being made by living gay Latinos. This book avoids that trap. Though there is a brief, cursory mention of Garcia Lorca, all the works analyzed here are about Latin Americans and US Latinos. Quiroga looks at cultural products from these two groups and provides commentary that combines the best thought of queer studies thinkers (Sedgwick, Halperin) with Latino academics (Ob
Jose Quiroga is Professor of Spanish at The George Washington University and author of Understanding Octavio Paz.