1st Edition
Auto/Biography across the Americas Transnational Themes in Life Writing
Auto/biographical narratives of the Americas are marked by the underlying themes of movement and belonging. This collection proposes that the impact of the historic or contemporary movement of peoples to, in, and from the Americas—whether chosen or forced—motivates the ways in which identities are constructed in this contested space. Such movement results in a cyclical quest to belong, and to understand belonging, that reverberates through narratives of the Americas. The volume brings together essays written from diverse national, cultural, linguistic, and disciplinary perspectives to trace these transnational motifs in life writing across the Americas. Drawing on international scholars from the seemingly disparate regions of the Americas—North America, the Caribbean, and Latin America—this book extends critical theories of life writing beyond limiting national boundaries. The scholarship included approaches narrative inquiry from the fields of literature, linguistics, history, art history, sociology, anthropology, political science, pedagogy, gender studies, critical race studies, and indigenous studies. As a whole, this volume advances discourse in auto/biography studies, life writing, and identity studies by locating transnational themes in narratives of the Americas and placing them in international and interdisciplinary conversations.
CONTENTS
List of Figures
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Reading beyond Boundaries
Chapter One: Timescapes, Backpacks, Networks
Chapter Two: Art, Identity, and Narration
Chapter Three: A Transnational Autobiographical Pact
Chapter Four: Between Nations, Between Selves
Chapter Five: Talking beyond Borders
Chapter Six: The Mediated Self in the Contested Domain of Caribbean Autobiography
Chapter Seven: Mapping Out a Treacherous Terrain
Chapter Eight: Decolonial Translation in Embodied Auto/Biographical Indigenous Performance
Chapter Nine: "See how I talk about the slavemaster"
Chapter Ten: Class and Class Awareness in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Chapter Eleven: The Paradoxical Demand for Realism
Chapter Twelve: "Forward!" National Identity, Animalographies, and the Ethics of Representation in the Posthuman Imaginary
Contributors
Index
Biography
Ricia Anne Chansky is Associate Professor of Literature at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez. She is editor of the journal Auto/Biography Studies and co-editor of The Routledge Auto/Biography Studies Reader (Routledge, 2016).
"In Auto/Biography Across the Americas, Chansky has collected twelve thought-provoking essays focusing on “points of connectivity”, linking life writing across the Americas. Chansky argues that these narratives are characterized broadly by two key themes: movement and belonging. More generally, she argues that auto/biography studies would benefit from centering theories, narratives, and disciplinary perspectives that destabilize nationalist frameworks for understanding literature and identity."- Theresa A. Kulbaga, Miami University