عنوان

Homelessness, Subjectivity and Nation-state in U.S. Central American Narratives

Number

TLpq2305847554

.Language of Text, Soundtrack etc

انگلیسی

Title Proper

Homelessness, Subjectivity and Nation-state in U.S. Central American Narratives

General Material Designation

[Thesis]

First Statement of Responsibility

Arango, Abel

Subsequent Statement of Responsibility

Medina, Ruben

Name of Publisher, Distributor, etc.

The University of Wisconsin - Madison

Date of Publication, Distribution, etc.

2019

Specific Material Designation and Extent of Item

229

Dissertation or thesis details and type of degree

Ph.D.

Body granting the degree

The University of Wisconsin - Madison

Text preceding or following the note

2019

Text of Note

Images of dispossession and homelessness occupy a central place in a corpus of novels that span from the 1990s until today. Second-generation, Central American novelists linger on questions of displacement as the characters in their narratives repeatedly find themselves living without a permanent home or community. Together these works offer me a new way of understanding Central Americans' liminality, given that they serve as a site that details the tensions around who is permitted to enter and occupy everyday living spaces, and by extension, the nation-state. Discouraged to settle in their countries of origin and denied citizenship in the U.S., Central American populations are de-legitimized and rendered stateless. Against these conditions, I advance the trope of homelessness as a counter-discourse that challenges an outdated nation-state system grounded in regimes of nationality and citizenship. The novels in this study have a subversive aim as they dismantle and generate alternative understandings of national belonging built upon the lines of territory, language (English only) and phenotype (White European). Instead I argue for a transnational approximation, suggesting that the nation-state is far from complete, given that the subjects of my study redraw territorial lines, frustrate fixed nationalities, develop new subjectivities and ultimately claim a sense of place.

Ethnic studies

Latin American literature

Literature

Arango, Abel

Medina, Ruben

Electronic name

p

[Thesis]

276903

a

Y