Overview

Embodying Difference: Scripting Social Images of the Female Body in Latina Theatre explores contemporary theatrical productions by Latina dramatists in the United States and focuses on the effects that neoliberal politics, global market strategies, gender formation, and racial and ethnic marginalization have had on Latinas. Through the analysis of select plays by dramatists Nao Bustamante, Coco Fusco, Anne García-Romero, Josefina López, Cherríe Moraga, Linda Nieves-Powell, Dolores Prida, and Milcha Sánchez-Scott, Embodying Difference shows how the bodies of Latinas are represented on stage in order to create an image of Latina consolidation. The performances of a dynamic female body challenge assumptions about ethno-racial expressions, exoticized “otherness,” and political correctness as this book explores often uneasy sites of representations of the body including phenotype, sexuality, obesity, and the body as a political marker. Drawing on the theoretical framework of difference, including differing gender voices, performances, and performative acts, Embodying Difference examines social images of the Latina body as a means of understanding and rearticulating Latina subjectivity through an expression of difference. By means of a gradual realization and self-acclamation of their own images, Latinas can learn to embody notions of self that endorse their curvaceous, sexualized, and oversized bodies that have historically been marked and marketed by their “brownness.”

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9781611476347

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Reviews

Linking performance and theater studies, women's studies, and Chicana/Latina feminist theory, Saborio (Northern Illinois Univ.) examines the language and staged social images of the female body in diverse representations of Latina subjects in theater. She argues that Latina characters in the plays she discusses redefine the language and images used by the systems that oppress them through a defiance of the body as a signifier of fixed identities and a rescripting of the oppressive language used to define it. After a cogent, well-researched, scholarly introduction that lays out the theoretical and critical frameworks, the six chapters of the book develop the main argument carefully and clearly. Each chapter builds on its predecessor: first, Saborio exposes dominant stereotypes; then she explores the critical possibilities of Latinidad; from there, she addresses the concept of a Latina body politic in grassroots feminist movements. She then theorizes the ways in which the Latina body has been gendered and racialized by capitalism and patriarchy, and the ways in which resistance is articulated along these lines. Finally, she offers a critique of the Catholic Church in Latin America in her discussion of Anne Garcia-Romero's play Santa Concepcion. Summing Up: Highly recommended. CHOICE

"Linking performance and theater studies, women's studies, and Chicana/Latina feminist theory, Saborío (Northern Illinois Univ.) examines the language and staged social images of the female body in diverse representations of Latina subjects in theater. She argues that Latina characters in the plays she discusses redefine the language and images used by the systems that oppress them ""through a defiance of the body as a signifier of fixed identities and a rescripting of the oppressive language used to define it."" After a cogent, well-researched, scholarly introduction that lays out the theoretical and critical frameworks, the six chapters of the book develop the main argument carefully and clearly. Each chapter builds on its predecessor: first, Saborío exposes dominant stereotypes; then she explores the critical possibilities of Latinidad; from there, she addresses the concept of a Latina body politic in grassroots feminist movements. She then theorizes the ways in which the Latina body has been gendered and racialized by capitalism and patriarchy, and the ways in which resistance is articulated along these lines. Finally, she offers a critique of the Catholic Church in Latin America in her discussion of Anne García-Romero's play Santa Concepción. Summing Up: Highly recommended. * CHOICE *"

Linking performance and theater studies, women's studies, and Chicana/Latina feminist theory, Saborio (Northern Illinois Univ.) examines the language and staged social images of the female body in diverse representations of Latina subjects in theater. She argues that Latina characters in the plays she discusses redefine the language and images used by the systems that oppress them through a defiance of the body as a signifier of fixed identities and a rescripting of the oppressive language used to define it. After a cogent, well-researched, scholarly introduction that lays out the theoretical and critical frameworks, the six chapters of the book develop the main argument carefully and clearly. Each chapter builds on its predecessor: first, Saborio exposes dominant stereotypes; then she explores the critical possibilities of Latinidad; from there, she addresses the concept of a Latina body politic in grassroots feminist movements. She then theorizes the ways in which the Latina body has been gendered and racialized by capitalism and patriarchy, and the ways in which resistance is articulated along these lines. Finally, she offers a critique of the Catholic Church in Latin America in her discussion of Anne Garcia-Romero's play Santa Concepcion. Summing Up: Highly recommended. * CHOICE *

Author Information

Linda Saborío is assistant professor of Spanish at Northern Illinois University.

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